Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass, an American slave

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NARRATIVE

OF THE

LIFE

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FREDERICK DOUGLASS,

AM

AMERICAN SLAVE.

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF.

BOSTON:
PUBLISHED AT THE ANTI-SLAVERY OFFICE,

Ho. 25 CORXHILL

1 845.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1845,

By Frederick Douglass,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.

PREFACE.

In the month of August, 1841, I attended an anti-
slavery convention in Nantucket, at which it was my
happiness to become acquainted with Frederick Doug-
lass, the writer of the following Narrative. He was a
stranger to nearly every member of that body ; but,
having recently made his escape from the southern
prison-house of bondage, and feeling his curiosity ex-
cited to ascertain the principles and measures of the
abolitionists, — of whom he had heard a somewhat
vague description while he was a slave, — he was in-
duced to give his attendance, on the occasion alluded
to, though at that time a resident in New Bedford.

Fortunate, most fortunate occurrence ! — fortunate
for the millions of his manacled brethren, yet panting
for deliverance from their awful thraldom ! — fortunate
for the cause of negro emancipation, and of universal
liberty ! — fortunate for the land of his birth, which he
has already done so much to save and bless ! — fortu-
nate for a large circle of friends and acquaintances,
whose sympathy and affection he has strongly secured
by the many sufferings he has endured, by his virtuous
traits of character, by his ever-abiding remembrance
of those who are in bonds, as being bound with them !
— fortunate for the multitudes, in various parts of our
republic, whose minds he has enlightened on the sub-
ject of slavery, and who have fcteen melted to tears by
his pathos, or roused to virtuous indignation by his stir-
ring eloquence against the i 3 of men ! — fortu-
tunate for himself, as it at once brought him into the

IV PREFACE.

field of public usefulness, " gave the world assurance
of a man," quickened the slumbering energies of his
soul, and consecrated him to the great work of break-
ing the rod of the oppressor, and letting the oppressed
go free !

I shall never forget his first speech at the convention

— the extraordinary emotion it excited in my own
mind — the powerful impression it created upon a
crowded auditory, completely taken by surprise — the
applause which followed from the beginning to the end
of his felicitous remarks. I think I never hated slavery
so intensely as at that moment ; certainly, my percep-
tion of the enormous outrage which is inflicted by it, on
the godlike nature of its victims, was rendered far more
clear than ever. There stood one, in physical propor-
tion and stature commanding and exact — in intellect
richly endowed — in natural eloquence a prodigy — in
soul manifestly " created but a little lower than the
angels " — yet a slave, ay, a fugitive slave, — trembling
for his safety, hardly daring to believe that on the
American soil, a single white person could be found
who would befriend him at all hazards, for the love of
God and humanity ! Capable of high attainments as
an intellectual and moral being — needing nothing but
a comparatively small amount of cultivation to make
him an ornament to society and a blessing to his race

— by the law of the land, by the voice of the people,
by the terms of the slave code, he was only a piece of
property, a beast of burden, a chattel personal, never-
theless !

A beloved friend from New Bedford prevailed on
Mr. Douglass to address the convention. He came
forward to the platform with a hesitancy and embar-
rassment, necessarily the attendants of a sensitive mind
in such a novel position. After apologizing for his-
ignorance, and reminding the audience that slavery
was a poor school for the human intellect and heart,

PREFACE. V

he proceeded to narrate some of the facts in his own
history as a slave, and in the course of his speech gave
utterance to many noble thoughts and thrilling reflec-
tions. As soon as he had taken his seat, filled with
hope and admiration, I rose, and declared that Patrick
Henry, .of revolutionary fame, never made a speech
more eloquent in the cause of liberty, than the one we
had just listened to from the lips of that hunted fugi-
tive. So I believed at that time — such is my belief
now. I reminded the audience of the peril which sur-
rounded this self-emancipated young man at the North,
— even in Massachusetts, on the soil of the Pilgrim
Fathers, among the descendants of revolutionary sires ;
and I appealed to them, whether they would ever allow
him to be carried back into slavery, — law or no law,
constitution or no constitution. ■ The response was
unanimous and in thunder-tones — "NO!" "Will
you succor and protect him as a brother-man — a resi-
dent of the old Bay State ? " " YES ! " shouted the
wrhole mass, with an energy so startling, that the ruth-
less tyrants south of Mason and Dixon's line might
almost have heard the mighty burst of feeling, and
recognized it as the pledge of an invincible determina-
tion, on the part of those who gave it, never to betray
him that wanders, but to hide the outcast, and firmly to
abide the consequences.

It was at once deeply impressed upon my mind, that,
if Mr. Douglass could be persuaded to consecrate his
time and talents to the promotion of the anti-slavery
enterprise, a powerful impetus would be given to it,
and a stunning blow at the same time inflicted on
northern prejudice against a colored complexion. I
therefore endeavored to instil hope and courage into
hjs mind, in order that he might dare to engage in a
vocation so anomalous and responsible for a person in
his situation ; and I was seconded in this eflbrt by
warm-hearted friends, especially by the late General

VI PREFACE.

Agent of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, Mr.
John A. Collins, whose judgment in this instance en-
tirely coincided with my own. At first, he could give
no encouragement ; with unfeigned diffidence, he ex-
pressed his conviction that he was not adequate to the
performance of so great a task ; the path marked out
was wholly an untrodden one ; he was sincerely ap-
prehensive that he should do more harm than good.
After much deliberation, however, he consented to
make a trial ; and ever since that period, he has acted
as a lecturing agent, under the auspices either of the
American or the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society.
In labors he has been most abundant ; and his success
in combating prejudice, in gaining proselytes, in agi-
tating the public mind, has far surpassed the most san-
guine expectations that were raised at the commence-
ment of his brilliant career. He has borne himself
with gentleness and meekness, yet with true manliness
of character. As a public speaker, he excels in pa-
thos, wit, comparison, imitation, strength of reasoning,
and fluency of language. There is in him that union
of head and heart, which is indispensable to an enlight-
enment of the heads and a winning of the hearts of
others. May his strength continue to be equal to his
day ! May he continue to " grow in grace, and in the
knowledge of God," that he may be increasingly ser-
viceable in the cause of bleeding humanity, whether at
home or abroad !

It is certainly a very remarkable fact, that one of
the most efficient advocates of the slave population,
now before the public, is a fugitive slave, in the person
of Frederick Douglass ; and that the free colored
population of the United States are as ably represented
by one of their own number, in the person of Charles
Lenox Remond, whose eloquent appeals have ex-
torted the highest applause of multitudes on both sides
of the Atlantic. Let the calumniators of the colored

TREFACE. Vll

race despise tliems or their baseness and illib-

eralitv of spirit, and henceforth cease to talk of the
natural inferiority of those who require nothing but
time and opportunity to attain to the highest point of
human excellence.

It may, perhaps, be fairly questioned, whether any
other portion of the population of the earth could have
endured the privations, sufferings and horrors of
slavery, without having become more degraded in the
scale of humanity than the slaves of African descent.
Nothing has been left undone to cripple their intellects,
darken their minds, debase their moral nature, oblit-
erate all traces of their relationship to mankind ; and
yet how wonderfully they have sustained the mighty
load of a most frightful bondage, under which they
have been groaning for centuries! To illustrate .the
effect of slavery on the white man, - — to show that he has
no powers of endurance, in such a condition, superior
to those of his black brother, — Daniel O'Connell, the
distinguished advocate of universal emancipation, and
the mightiest champion of prostrate but not conquered
Ireland, relates the following anecdote in a speech de-
livered by him in the Conciliation Hall, Dublin, before
the Loyal National Repeal Association, March 31,
1845. "No matter," said Mr. O'Conxell, "under
what specious term it may disguise itself, slavery is
still hideous. It has a natural, an inevitable tendency
to brutalize every noble fa cult y of man. An American
sailor, who was cast away on the shore of Africa,
where he was kept in slavery for three years, was, at
the expiration of that period, found to be imbruted and
stultified- — he had lost all reasoning power; and hav-
ing forgotten his native language, could only utter some
savage gibberish between Arabic and English, which
nobody could understand, and which even he himself
found difficulty in pronouncing. So much for the hu-
manizing influence of the domestic institution ! "

Vlll PREFACE.

Admitting this to have been an extraordinary case of
mental deterioration, it proves at least that the white
slave can sink as low in the scale of humanity as the
black one.

Mr. Douglass has very properly chosen to write his
own Narrative, in his own style, and according to the
best of his ability, rather than to employ some one else.
It is, therefore, entirely his own production ; and, con-
sidering how long and dark was the career he had to run
as a slave, — how few have been his opportunities to
improve his mind since he broke his iron fetters, — it
is, in my judgment, highly creditable to his head and
heart. He who can peruse it without a tearful eye, a
heaving breast, an afflicted spirit, — without being
filled with an unutterable abhorrence of slavery and
all its abettors, and animated with a determination to
seek the immediate overthrow of that execrable sys-
tem,— without trembling for the fate of this country
in the hands of a righteous God, who is ever on the
side of the oppressed, and whose arm is not shortened
that it cannot save, — must have a flinty heart, and be
qualified to act the part of a trafficker " in slaves and
the souls of men.'1 I am confident that it is essen-
tially true in all its statements ; that nothing has been
set down in malice, nothing exaggerated, nothing drawn
from the imagination ; that it comes short of the reality,
rather than overstates a single fact in regard to
slavery as it is. The experience of Frederick
Douglass, as a slave, was not a peculiar one ; his lot
was not especially a hard one ; his case may be re-
garded as a very fair specimen of the treatment of
slaves in Maryland, in which State it is conceded that
they are better fed and less cruelly treated than in
Georgia, Alabama, or Louisiana. Many have suffered
incomparably more, while very few on the plantations
have suffered less, than himself. Yet how deplorable
was his situation ! what terrible chastisements were

PREFACE. IX

inflicted upon his person ! what still more shocking
outrages were perpetrated upon his mind ! with all his
nohle powers and sublime aspirations, how like a brute
was he treated, even by those professing to have the
same mind in them that was in Christ Jesus ! to what
dreadful liabilities was he continually subjected ! how
destitute of friendly counsel and aid, even in his
greatest extremities ! how heavy was the midnight of
woe which shrouded in blackness the last ray of hope,
and filled the future with terror and gloom ! what
longings after freedom took possession of his breast,
and how Ins misery augmented, in proportion as he
grew reflective and intelligent, — thus demonstrating
that a happy slave is an extinct man ! how he thought,,
reasoned, felt, under the lash of the driver, with the
chains upon his limbs ! what perils he encountered in
his endeavors to escape from his horrible doom ! and
how signal have been his deliverance and preservation
in the midst of a nation of pitiless enemies !

This Narrative contains many affecting incidents,
many passages of great eloquence and power ; but 1
think the most thrilling one of them all is the descrip-
tion Douglass gives of his feelings, as he stood so-
liloquizing respecting his fate, and the chances of his
one day being a freeman, on the banks of the Chesa-
peake Bay — viewing the receding vessels as they flew
with their white wings before the breeze, and apostro-
phizing them as animated by the living spirit of free-
dom. Who can read that passage, and be insensible
to its pathos and sublimity ? Compressed into it is a
whole Alexandrian library of thought, feeling, and sen-
timent— all that can, all that need be urged, in the
form of expostulation, entreaty, rebuke, against that
crime of crimes, — making man the property of his
fellow-man ! O, how accursed is that system, which
entombs the godlike mind of man, defaces the divine
image, reduces those who by creation were crowned

X PREFACE.

with glory and honor to a level with four-footed beasts,
and exalts the dealer in human flesh above all that is
called God ! Why should its existence be prolonged
one hour ? Is it not evil, only evil, and that con-
tinually ? What does its presence imply but the ab-
sence of all fear of God, all regard for man, on the
part of the people of the United States ? Heaven
speed its eternal overthrow !

So profoundly ignorant of the nature of slavery are
many persons, that they are stubbornly incredulous
whenever they read or listen to any recital of the
cruelties which are daily inflicted on its victims. They
do not deny that the slaves are held as property ; but
that terrible fact seems to convey to their minds no
idea of injustice, exposure to outrage, or savage bar-
barity. Tell them of cruel scourgings, of mutilations
and brandings, of scenes of pollution and blood, of the
banishment of all light and knowledge, and they affect
to be greatly indignant at such enormous exagger-
ations, such wholesale misstatements, such abominable
libels on the character of the southern planters ! As
if all these direful outrages were not the natural results
of slavery ! As if it were less cruel to reduce a hu-
man being to the condition of a thing, than to give him
a severe flagellation, or to deprive him of necessary
food and clothing! -As if whips, chains, thumb-screws,
paddles, bloodhounds, overseers, drivers, patrols, were
not all indispensable to keep the slaves down, and to
give protection to their ruthless oppressors ! As if,
when the marriage institution is abolished, concubinage,
adultery, and incest, must not necessarily abound ; when
all the rights of humanity are annihilated, any barrier
remains to protect the victim from the fury of the
spoiler ;' when absolute power is assumed over life and
liberty, it will not be wielded with destructive sway !
Skeptics of this character abound in society. In some
few instances, their incredulity arises from a want of

PREFACE. XI

reflection ; but, generally, it indicates a hatred of the
light, a desire to shield slavery from the assaults of
its foes, a contempt of the colored race, whether
bond or free. Such will try to discredit the shocking
tales of slaveholding cruelty which are rccordc
this truthful Narrative ; but they will labor in vain.
Mr. Douglass has frankly disclosed the place of 1.:.
birth, the names of those who claimed ownersh;,
his body and soul, and the names also of those who
committed the crimes which he has alleged against
them. His statements, therefore, may easily be
proved, if they are untrue.

In the course of his Narrative, he relates two in-
stances of murderous cruelty, — in one of wrhich a
planter deliberately shot a slave belonging to a neigh-
boring plantation, who had unintentionally gotten with-
in his lordly domain in quest of fish ; and in the other.
an overseer blew out the brains of a slave who had
fled to a stream of water to escape a bloody scourging.
Mr. Douglass states that in neither of these instances
was any thing done by way of legal arrest or judicial
investigation. The Baltimore American, of March IT,
1845, relates a similar case of atrocity, perpetrated
with similar impunity — as follows: — " Shooting a
Slave. — We learn, upon the authority of a letter from
Charles county, Maryland, received by a gentleman of
this city, that a young man, named Matthews, a
nephew of General Matthews, and whose father, it is
believed, holds an office at Washington, killed one of
the slaves upon his father's farm by shooting him.
The letter states that young Matthews had been left in
charge of the farm ; that he gave an order to the
vant, which was disobeyed, when he proceeded to
house, obtained a gun, and, returning, shot the sen-
ile immediately, the letter continues, fled to his
father's residence, where he still remains unmc
— Let it never be forgotten, that no slavehokk

Xll PREFACE.

overseer can be convicted of any outrage perpetrated
on the person of a slave, however diabolical it may be,
on the testimony of colored witnesses, whether bond 01
free. By the slave code, they are adjudged to be as
incompetent to testify against a white man, as though
they were indeed a part of the brute creation. Hence,
there is no legal protection in fact, whatever there may
be in form, for the slave population ; and any amount
of cruelty may be inflicted on them with impunity. Is
it possible for the human mind to conceive of a more
horrible state of society ? ^

The effect of a religious profession on the conduct
of southern masters is vividly described in the follow-
ing Narrative, and shown to be any thing but salutary.
In the nature of the case, it must be in the highest de-
gree pernicious. The testimony of Mr. Douglass, on
this point, is sustained by a cloud of witnesses, whose
veracity is unimpeachable. " A slaveholder's profes-
sion of Christianity is a palpable imposture. He is a
felon of the highest grade. He is a man-stealer. It
is of no importance what you put in, the other scale."

Reader ! are you with the man-stealers in sympathy
and purpose, or on the side of their down-trodden vic-
tims ? If with the former, then are you the foe of
God and man. If with the latter, what are you pre-
pared to do and dare in their behalf? Be faithful, be
vigilant, be untiring in your efforts to break every yoke,
and let the oppressed go free. Come what may —
cost what it may — inscribe on the banner which you
unfurl to the breeze, as your religious and political
motto — " No Compromise with Slavery ! No
Union with Slaveholders ! "

WM. LLOYD GARRISON.
Boston, May 1, 1845.

LETTER

FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ.

Boston, April 22, 1845.
My Dear Friend :

Yott remember the old fable of " The Man
and the Lion," where the lion complained that he
should not be so misrepresented " when the lions wrote
history."

I am glad the time has come when the " lions write
history." We have been left long enough to gather
the character of slavery from the involuntary evidence
of the masters. One might, indeed, rest sufficiently
satisfied with what, it is evident, must be, in general, the
results of such a relation, without seeking farther to find
whether they have followed in every instance. Indeed,
those who stare at the half-peck of corn a week, and
love to count the lashes on the slave's back, are seldom
the " stuff" out of which reformers and abolitionists
are to be made. I remember that, in 1838, many were
waiting for the results of the West India experiment,
before they could come into our ranks. Those
" results " have come long ago ; but, alas ! few of
that number have come with them, as converts. A
man must be disposed to judge of emancipation by
other testa than whether it has increased the produce
of sugar, — and to hate slavery for other reasons than
because it starves men and whips women, — before
he is ready to lay the first stone of his anti-slavery life

XIV LETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ.

I was glad to learn, in your story, how early the most
neglected of God's children waken to a sense of their
rights, and of the injustice done them. Experience is
a keen teacher ; and long before you had mastered
your A B C, or knew where the " white sails " of
the Chesapeake were bound, you began, I see, to
gauge the wretchedness of the slave, not by his hunger
and want, not by his lashes and toil, but by the cruel
and blighting death which gathers over his soul.

In connection with this, there is one circumstance
which makes your recollections peculiarly valuable,
and renders your early insight the more remarkable.
You come from that part of the country where we are
told slavery appears with its fairest features. Let us
hear, then, what it is at its best estate — gaze on its
bright side, if it has one ; and then imagination may
task her powers to add dark lines to the picture, as
she travels southward to that (for the colored man)
Valley of the Shadow of Death, where the Mississippi
sweeps along.

Again, we have known you long, and can put the
most entire confidence in your truth, candor, and sin-
cerity. Every one who has heard you speak has felt,
and, I am confident, every one who reads your book
will feel, persuaded that you give them a fair specimen
of the whole truth. No one-sided portrait, — no whole-
sale complaints, — but strict justice done, whenever
individual kindliness has neutralized, for a moment,
the deadly system with which it was strangely allied.
You have been with us, too, some years, and can
fairly compare the twilight of rights, which your race
enjoy at the North, with that " noon of night " under
which they labor south of Mason and Dixon's line.
Tell us whether, after all, the half-free colored man
of Massachusetts is worse off than the pampered
slave of the rice swamps !

In reading your life, no one can say that we have

LETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ. XV

unfairly picked out some rare specimens of cruelty.
We know that the bitter drops, which even you have
drained from the cup, are no incidental aggravations,
no individual ills, but such as must mingle always and
necessarily in the lot of every slave. They are the
essential ingredients, not the occasional results, of the
system.

After all, I shall read your book with trembling
for you. Some years ago, when you were beginning
to tell me your real name and birthplace, you may
remember I stopped you, and preferred to remain
ignorant of all. With the exception of a vague
description, so I continued, till the other day, when you
read me your memoirs. I hardly knew, at the time,
whether to thank you or not for the sight of them,
when I reflected that it was still dangerous, in Massa-
chusetts, for honest men to tell their names ! They
say the fathers, in 1776, signed the Declaration of
Independence with the halter about their necks.
You, too, publish your declaration of freedom with
danger compassing you around. In all the broad lands
which the Constitution of the United States over-
shadows, there is no single spot, — however narrow or
desolate, — where a fugitive slave can plant himself
and say, " I am safe." The whole armory of North-
ern Law has no shield for you. I am free to say that,
in your place, I should throw the MS. into the fire.

You, perhaps, may tell your story in safety, endeared
as you are to so many warm hearts by rare gifts, and a
still rarer devotion of them to the service of others.
But it will be owing only to your labors, and the fear-
less efforts of those who, trampling the laws and Con-
stitution of the country under their feet, are determined
that they will " hide the outcast," and that their hearths
shall be, spite of the law, an asylum for the oppressed,
if, some time or other, the humblest may stand in our

XVI LETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ.

streets, and bear witness in safety against the -cruel-
ties of which he has been the victim.

Yet it is sad to think, that these very throbbing hearts
which welcome your story, and form your best safe-
guard in telling it, are all beating contrary to the " stat-
ute in such case made and provided." Go on, my dear
friend, till you, and those who, like you, have been
saved, so as by fire, from the dark prison-house, shall
stereotype these free, illegal pulses into statutes ; and
New England, cutting loose from a blood-stained
Union, shall glory in being the house of refuge for the
oppressed ; — till we no longer 'merely " hide the out-
cast," or make a merit of standing idly by while he
is hunted in our midst; but, consecrating anew the soil
of the Pilgrims as an asylum for the oppressed, proclaim
our ivelcome to the slave so loudly, that the tones shall
reach eVery hut in the Carolinas, and make the bro-
ken-hearted bondman leap up at the thought of old
Massachusetts.

God speed the day !

Till then, and ever,

Yours truly,

WENDELL PHILLIPS.

Frederick Douglass.

NARRATIVE

OF THK

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS.

CHAPTER I.

I was born in Tuckahoe, near Hillsborough, and
about twelve miles from Easton, in Talbot county.
Maryland. I have no accurate knowledge of my age,
never having seen any authentic record containing it.
By far the larger part of the slaves know as little of
their ages as horses know of theirs, and it is the wish
of most masters within my knowledge to keep their
slaves thus ignorant. I do not remember to have ever
met a slave who could tell of his birthday. They
seldom come nearer to it than planting-time, harvest-
time, cherry-time, spring-time, or fall-time. A want
of information concerning my own was a source of
unhappiness to me even during childhood. The white
children could tell their ages. I could not tell why 1
ought to be deprived of the same privilege. I was
not allowed to make any inquiries of my master con-
cerning it. He deemed all such inquiries on the part
of a slave improper and impertinent, and evidence of
1

Z NARRATIVE OF THE

a restless spirit. The nearest estimate I can give
makes me now between twenty-seven and twenty -
eigjit years of age. I come to this, from hearing my
master say, some time during 1835, 1 was about seven-
teen years old.

My mother was named Harriet Bailey. She was
the daughter of Isaac and Betsey Bailey, both colored,
and quite dark. My mother was of a darker com-
plexion than either my grandmother or grandfather.

My father was a white man. He was admitted to
be such by all I ever heard speak of my parentage.
The opinion was also whispered that my master was
my father; but of the correctness of this opinion, I
know nothing ; the means of knowing was withheld
from me. My mother and I were separated when I
was but an infant — before I knew her as my mother.
It is a common custom, in the part of Maryland from
which I ran away, to part children from their mothers
at a very early age. Frequently, before the child has
reached its twelfth month, its mother is taken from it,
and hired out on some farm a considerable distance
off, and the child is placed under the care of an old
woman, too old for field labor. For what this sep-
aration is done, I do not know, unless it be to hinder
the development of the child's affection toward its
mother, and to blunt and destroy the natural affection
of the mother for the child. This is the inevitable
result.

I never saw my mother, to know her as such, more
than four or five times in my life ; and each of these
times was very short in duration, and at night. She
was hired by a Mr. Stewart, who lived about twelve

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 8

miles from my home. She made her journeys to see
me in the night, travelling the whole distance on fool,
after the performance of her day's work. She was a
field hand, and a whipping is the penalty of not being
in the field at sunrise, unless a slave has special per-
mission from his or her master to the contrary — a
permission which they seldom get, and one that gives
to him that gives it the proud name of being a kind
master. I do not recollect of ever seeing my mother
by the light of day. She was with me in the night.
She would lie down with me, and get me to sleep, but
long before I waked she was gone. Very little com-
munication ever took place between us. Death soon
ended what little we could have while she lived, and
with it her hardships and suffering. She died when I
was about seven years old, on one of my master's
farms, near Lee's Mill. I was not allowed to be
present during her illness, at her death, or burial.
She was gone long before I knew any thing about it.
Never having enjoyed, to any considerable extent, her
soothing presence, her tender and watchful care, I re-
ceived the tidings of her death with much the same
emotions I should have probably felt at the death of a
stranger.

Called thus suddenly away, she left me without the
slightest intimation of who my father was. The whis-
per that my master was my father, may or may not
be true ; and, true or false, it is of but little conse-
quence to my purpose whilst the fact remains, in all its
glaring odiousness, that slaveholders have ordained,
and by law established, that the children of slave
women shall in all cases follow the condition of their

4 NARRATIVE OF THE

mothers ; and this is done too obviously to administer
to their own lusts, and make a gratification of their
wicked desires profitable as well as pleasurable ; for
by this cunning arrangement, the slaveholder, in
cases not a few, sustains to his slaves the double rela-
tion of master and father,

I know of such cases ; and it is worthy of remark
that such slaves invariably suffer greater hardships, and
have more to contend with, than others. They are, in
the first place, a constant offence to their mistress.
She is ever disposed to find fault with them ; they can
seldom do any thing to please her ; she is never better
pleased than when she sees them under the lash,
especially when she suspects her husband of showing
to his mulatto children favors which he withholds from
his black slaves. The master is frequently compelled
to sell this class of his slaves, out of deference to the
feelings of his white wife ; and, cruel as the deed may
strike any one to be, for a man to sell his own children
to human flesh-mongers, it is often the dictate of hu-
manity for him to do so ; for, unless he does this, he
must not only whip them himself, but must stand by
and see one white son tie up his brother, of but few
shades darker complexion than himself, and ply the
gory lash to his naked back ; and if he lisp one
word of disapproval, it is set down to his parental par-
tiality, and only makes a bad matter worse, both for
himself and the slave whom he would protect and
defend.

Every year brings with it multitudes of this class of
slaves. It was doubtless in consequence of a knowl-
edge of this fact, that one great statesman of the south

. OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. D

predicted the downfall of slaver}' by the inevitable
laws of population. Whether this prophecy is ever
fulfilled or not, it is nevertheless plain that a very
different-looking class of people are springing up at the
south, and are now held in slavery, from those origin-
ally brought to this country from Africa; and if their
increase will do no other good, it will do away the
force of the argument, that God cursed Ham, and
therefore American slavery is right. If the lineal
descendants of Ham are alone to be scripturally en-
slaved, it is certain that slavery at tjje south must soon
become unscriptural ; for thousands are ushered into
the world, annually, who, like myself, owe their ex-
istence to white fathers, and those fathers most fre-
quently their own masters.

I have had two masters. My first master's name
was Anthony. I do not remember his first name.
He was generally called Captain Anthony — a title
which, I presume, he acquired by sailing a craft on the
Chesapeake Bay. He was not considered a rich slave-
holder. He owned two or three farms, and about
thirty slaves. His farms and slaves were under the
care of an overseer. The overseer's name was Plum-
mer. Mr. Plummer was a miserable drunkard, a pro-
fane swearer, and a savage monster. He always went
armed with a cowskin and a heavy cudgel. T have
known him to cut and slash the women's heads so
horribly, that even master would be enraged at his
cruelty, and would threaten to whip him if he did not
mind himself. Master, however, was not a humane
slaveholder. It required extraordinary barbarity on
the part of an overseer to affect him. He was a cruel

O NARRATIVE OF THE

man, hardened by a long life of slaveholding. He
would at times seem to take great pleasure in whipping
a slave. I have often been awakened at the dawn of
day by the most heart-rending shrieks of an own aunt
of mine, whom he used to tie up to a joist, and whip
upon her naked back till she was literally covered with
blood. No words, no tears, no prayers, from his gory
victim, seemed to move his iron heart from its bloody
purpose. The louder she screamed, the harder he
whipped ; and where the blood ran fastest, there he
whipped longest. fHe would whip her to make her
scream, and whip her to make her hush ; and not
until overcome by fatigue, would he cease to swing the
blood-clotted cowskin. I remember the first time I
ever witnessed this horrible exhibition. I was quite a
child, but I well remember it. I never shall forget it
whilst I remember any thing. It 'was the first of a
long series of such outrages, of which I was doomed
to be a witness and a participant. It struck me with
awful force. It was the blood-stained gate, the en-
trance to the hell of slavery, through which I was
about to pass. It was a most terrible spectacle. I
wish I could commit to paper the feelings with which I
beheld it.

This occurrence took place very soon after I went
to live with my old master, and under the following
circumstances. Aunt Hester went out one night, —
where or for what I do not know, — and happened to
be absent when my master desired her presence. He
had ordered her not to go out evenings, and warned
her tliat she must never let him catch her in company
with a young man, who was paying attention to her,

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 7

belonging to Colonel Lloyd. The young man's name

Ned Roberts, generally called Lloyd'
Why master was so careful of her, may be safely left
to conjecture. • She was a woman of noble form, and
of graceful proportions, having very few equals, and
fewer superiors, in personal appearance, among the
colored or white women of our neighborhood.

Aunt Hester had not only disobeyed his orders in
going out, but had been found in company with Lloyd's
Ned ; which circumstance, I found, from what he said
while whipping her, was the chief offence. Had he
been a man of pure morals himself, he might have
been thought interested in protecting the innocence of
my aunt ; but those who knew him will not suspect
him of any such virtue. Before he commenced
whipping Aunt Hester, he took her into the kitchen,
and stripped her from neck to waist, leaving her neck,
shoulders, .and back, entirely naked. He then told
her to cross her hands, calling her at the same time a

d d b h. After crossing her hands, he tied

them with a strong rope, and led her to a stool under a
large hook in the joist, put in for the purpose. He made
her get upon the stool, and tied her hands to the hook.
She now stood fair for his infernal purpose. 'Her
arms were stretched up at their full length, so that she
stood upon the ends of her toes. He then said to her,

"Now, you d d b h, I'll learn you how to

disobey my orders!" and after rolling up his sleeves,
he commenced to lay on the heavy cowskin, and soon
the warm, red blood (amid heart-rending shrieks from
her, and horrid oaths from him) came dripping to the
floor. I was so terrified and horror-stricken at the

8 NARRATIVE OF THL

:, that I hid myself in a closet, and dared not
venture out till long after the bloody transaction was
over. I expected it would be my turn next. It was
all new to me. I had never seen any thing like it
before. I had always lived with my grandmother on
the outskirts of the plantation, where she was put to
raise the children of the younger women. I had there-
fore been, until now, out of the way of the bloody
scenes that often occurred on the plantation.

CHAPTER II.

My master's family consisted of two sons, Andrew
and Richard ; one daughter, Lucretia, and her husband,
Captain Thomas Auld. They lived in one house,
upon the home plantation of Colonel Edward Lloyd,
master was Colonel Lloyd's clerk and superintend-
He was what might be. called the overseer of
the overseers. I spent two years of childhood on this
plantation in my old master's family. It was here that
I witnessed the bloody transaction recorded in the first
chapter; and as I received my first impressions of
slavery on this plantation, I. will give some description
uf it, and of slavery as it there existed. The planta-
tion is about twelve miles north of Easton, in Talbot
county, and is situated on the border of Miles River,
principal products raised upon it were tobacco,
corn, aud wheat. These were raised in great, at

LITE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 9

dance ; so that, with the products of this and the other
farms belonging to him, he was able to keep in almost
constant employment a large sloop, in carrying them to
market at Baltimore. This sloop was named Sally
Lloyd, in honor of one of the colonel's daughters.
My master's son-in-law, Captain Auld, was master of
the vessel ; she was otherwise manned by the colonel's
own slaves. Their names were Peter, Isaac, Rich,
and Jake. These were esteemed very highly by the
other slaves, and looked upon as the privileged ones
of the plantation ; for it was no small affair, in the
eyes of the slaves, to be allowed to see Baltimore.

Colonel Lloyd kept from three to four hundred
slaves on his home plantation, and owned a large
number more on the neighboring farms belonging to
him. The names of the farms nearest to the home
plantation were Wye Town and New Design. " Wye
Town" was under the overseership of a man named
Noah Willis. New Design was under the overseer-
ship of a Mr. Townsend. The overseers of these, and
all the rest of the farms, numbering over twenty, re-
ceived advice and direction from the managers of the
home plantation. This was the great business place.
It was the seat of government for the whole twenty
farms. All disputes among the overseers were settled
here. If a slave was convicted of any high misde-
inor, became unmanageable, or evinced a deter-
mination to run away, he was brought immediately
here, severely whipped, put on board the sloop, carried
to Baltimore, and sold to Austin Woolfolk, or some
other slave-trader, as a warnino; to the slaves remain'ms.

Here, too, the slaves of all the other farms received

10 NARRATIVE OF THE

their monthly allowance of food, and their yearly
clothing. The men and women slaves received, as
their monthly allowance of food, eight pounds of pork,
or its equivalent in fish, and one bushel of corn meal.
Their yearly clothing consisted of two coarse linen
shirts, one pair of linen trousers, like the shirts, one
jacket, one pair of trousers for winter, made of coarse
negro cloth, one pair of stockings, and one pair of shoes ;
the whole of which .could not have cost more than
seven dollars. The allowance of the slave children
was given to their mothers, or the old women having
the care of them. The children unable to work in the
field had neither shoes, stockings, jackets, nor trousers,
given to them ; their clothing consisted of two coarse
linen shirts per year. When these failed them, they
went naked until the next allowance-day. Children
from seven to ten years old, of both sexes, almost
naked, might be seen at all seasons of the year.

There were no beds given the slaves, unless one
coarse blanket be considered such, and none but the
men and women had these. This, however, is not
considered a very great privation. They find less
difficulty from the want of beds, than from the want
of time to sleep; for when their day's work in the
field is done, the most of them having their washing,
mending, and cooking to do, and having few or none
of the ordinary facilities for doing either of these, very
many of their sleeping hours are consumed in pre-
paring for the field the coming day ; and when this is
done, old and young, male and female, married and
single, drop down side by side, on one common bed, —
the cold, damp floor, — each covering himself or herself

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 11

with their miserable blankets ; and here they sleep till
they are summoned to the field by the driver's horn.
At the sound of this, all must rise^and be off to the
field. There must be no halting ; every one must be
at his or her post ; and woe betides them who hear not
this morning summons to the field ; for if they are not
awakened by the sense of hearing, they are by the
sense of feeling: no age nor sex finds any favor. Mr.
Severe, the overseer, used to stand by the door of the
quarter, armed with a large hickory stick and heavy
cowskin, ready to whip any one who was so unfortu-
nate as not to hear, or, from any other cause, was pre-
vented from being ready to start for the field at the
sound of the horn.

Mr. Severe was rightly named : he was a cruel
man. I have seen him whip a woman, causing the
blood to run half an hour at the time ; and this, too, in
the midst of her crying children, pleading for their
mother's release. He seemed to take pleasure in
manifesting his fiendish barbarity. Added to his
cruelty, he was a profane swearer. It was enough to
chill the blood and stiffen the hair of an ordinary man
to hear him talk. Scarce a sentence escaped him but
that was commenced or concluded by some horrid
oath. The field was the place to witness his cruelty
and profanity. His presence made it both the field of
blood and of blasphemy. From the rising till the
going down of the sun, he was cursing, raving, cutting,
and slashing among the slaves of the field, in the most
frightful manner. I lis career was short. He died
soon after I went to Colonel Lloyd's; and he
died as he lived, uttering, with his dying groans, bitter

12 NARRATIVE OF THE

curses and horrid oaths. His death was regarded by
the slaves as the result of a merciful providence.

Mr. Severe's place was filled by a Mr. Hopkins.
He was a very different man. He was less cruel,
less profane, and made less noise, than Mr. Severe.
His course was characterized by no extraordinary
demonstrations of cruelty. He whipped, but seemed
to take no pleasure in it. He was called by the slaves
a good overseer.

The home plantation of Colonel Lloyd wore the
appearance of a country village. All the mechanical
operations for all the farms were performed here.
The shoemaking and mending, the blacksmithing,
cartwrighting, coopering, weaving, and grain-grinding,
were all performed by the slaves on the home planta-
tion. The whole place wore a business-like aspect
very unlike the neighboring farms. The number of
houses, too, conspired to give it advantage over the
neighboring farms. It was called by the slaves the
Great House Farm. Few privileges were esteemed
higher, by the slaves of the out-farms, than that of
being selected to do errands at the Great House Farm.
It was associated in their minds with greatness. A
representative could not be prouder of his election to a
seat in the American Congress, than a slave on one of
the out-farms would be of his election to do errands at
the Great House Farm. They regarded it as evi-
dence of great confidence reposed in them by their
overseers ; and it was on this account, as well as a
constant desire to be out of the field from under the
driver's lash, that they esteemed it a high privilege, one
worth careful living for. He was called the smartest

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 13

and most trusty fellow, who had this honor conferred
upon him the most frequently. The competitors for
this office sought as diligently to please their overseers,
as the office-seekers in the political parties seek to
please and deceive the people. The same traits of
character might be seen in Colonel Lloyd's slaves, as
are seen in the slaves of the political parties.

The slaves selected to go to the Great House Farm,
for the monthly allowance for themselves and their
fellow-slaves, were peculiarly enthusiastic. While on
their way, they would make the dense old woods, for
miles around, reverberate with their wild songs, reveal-
ing at once the highest joy and the deepest sadness.
They would compose and sing as they went along,
consulting neither time nor tune. The thought that
came up, came out — if not in the* word, in the sound ;
— and as frequently in the one as in the other. They
would sometimes sing the most pathetic sentiment in
the most rapturous tone, and the most rapturous senti-
ment in the most pathetic tone. Into all of their songs
they would manage to weave something of the Great
House Farm. Especially would they do this, when
leaving home. They would then sing most exultingly
the following words : —

" L am going away to the Great House Farm !
O, yea! O, yea ! O!"

This they would sing, as a chorus, to words which to
many would seem unmeaning jargon, but which, never-
theless, were full of meaning to themselves. I have
sometimes thought that the mere hearing of those
songs would do more to in: >me minds with the

14 NARRATIVE OF THE

horrible character of slavery, than the reading of whole
volumes of philosophy on the subject could do.

I did not, when a slave, understand the deep mean-
ing of those rude and apparently incoherent songs.
I was myself within the circle ; so that I neither saw
nor heard as those without might see and hear. They
told a tale of woe which was then altogether beyond
my feeble comprehension ; they were tones loud, long,
and deep ; they breathed the prayer and complaint of
souls boiling over with the bitterest anguish. Every
tone was a testimony against slavery, and a prayer to
God for deliverance from chains. The hearing of
those wild notes always depressed my spirit, and filled
me with ineffable sadness. I have frequently found
myself in tears while hearing them. The mere re-
currence to those songs, even now, afflicts me ; and
while I am writing these lines, an expression of feeling
has already found its way down my cheek. To those
songs I trace my first glimmering conception of the
dehumanizing character of slavery. I can never get
rid of that conception. Those songs still follow me, to
deepe'n my hatred of slavery, and quicken my sympa-
thies for my brethren in bonds. If any one wishes to
be impressed with the soul-killing effects of slavery,
let him go to Colonel Lloj^d's plantation, and, on allow-
ance-day, place himself in the deep pine woods, and
there let him, in silence, analyze the sounds that shall
pass through the chambers of his soul, — and if he is
not thus impressed, it will only be because " there is
no flesh in his obdurate heart."

I have oft^n been utterly astonished, since I came to
the north, to find persons who could speak of the sing-

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 15

ing, among sla\ evidence of their contentment

and happiness. It is impossible to conceive of a great-
er mistake. Slaves sing most when they are most un-
happy. The songs of the slave represent the sorrows
of his heart ; and he is relieved by them, only as an
aching heart*is relieved by its tears. At least, such is
my experience. I have often sung to drown my sor-
row, but seldom to express my happiness. Crying for
joy, and singing for joy, were alike uncommon to me
while in the jaws of slavery. The singing of a man
cast away upon a desolate island might be as appro-
priately considered as evidence of contentment and
happiness, as the singing of a slave ; the songs of the
one and of the other are prompted by the same
emotion.

CHAPTER III.

Colonel Lloyd kept a large and finely cultivated
garden, which afforded almost constant employment
for four men, besides the chief gardene^r, (Mr. M'Dur-
mond.) This garden was probably the greatest attrac-
tion of the place. During jhe summer months, people
came from far and near — from Baltimore, Easton,
and Annapolis — to see it. It abounded in fruits of
almost every description, from the hardy apple of the
north to the delicate orange of the south. This garden
was not the least source of trouble on the plantation.
Its excellent fruit was quite a temptation to the hungry

16 NARRATIVE OF THE

swarms of boys, as well as the older slaves, belonging to
the colonel, few of whom had the virtue or the vice to
resist it. Scarcely a day passed, during the summer,
but that some slave had to take the lash for stealing
fruit. The colonel had to resort to all kinds of strat-
agems to keep his slaves out of the garden. The last
and most successful one was that of tarring his fence
all around ; after which, if a slave was caught with any
tar upon his person, it was deemed sufficient proof that
he had either been into the garden, or had tried to get
in. In either case, he was severely whipped by the
chief gardener. This plan worked well ; the slaves
became as fearful of tar as of the lash. They seemed
to realize the impossibility of touching tar without
being defiled.

The colonel also kept a splendid riding equipage.
His stable and carriage-house presented the appear-
ance of some of our large city livery establishments.
His horses were of the finest form and noblest blood.
His carriage-house contained three splendid coaches,
three or four gigs, besides dearborns and barouches of
the most fashionable style.

This establishment was under the care of two slaves
— old Barney and young Barney — father and son.
To attend to- tfiis establishment was their sole work.
But it was by no means an easy employment ; for in
nothing was Colonel Lloyd tnore particular than in the
management of his horses. The slightest inattention
to these was unpardonable, and was visited upon those,
under whose care they were placed, with the severest
punishment ; no excuse could shield them, if the
colonel only suspected any want of attention to his

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 17

horses — a supposition which he frequently indulged,
and one which, of course, made the office of old and
young Barney a very trying one. They never knew
when they were safe from punishment. They were
frequently whipped when least deserving, and escaped
whipping when most deserving it. Every thing de-
pended upon the looks of the horses, and the state of
Colonel Lloyd's own mind when his horses were
hrought to him for use. If a horse did not move fast
enough, or hold his head high enough, it was owing to
some fault of his keepers. It was painful to stand
near the stable-door, and hear the various complaints
against the keepers when a horse was taken out for
use. " This horse has not had proper attention. He
has not been sufficiently rubbed and curried, or he
has not been properly fed ; his food was too wet or too
dry ; he got it too soon or too late ; he was too hot or
too cold ; he had too much hay, and not enough of grain :
or he had too much grain, and not enough of hay ; instead
of old Barney's attending to the horse, he had very im-
properly left it to his son." To all these complaints, no
matter how unjust, the slave must answer never a word.
Colonel Lloyd could not brook any contradiction from
a slave. When he spoke, a slave must stand, listen,
and tremble; and such was literally the case. I have
seen Colonel Lloyd make old Barney, a man betw
fifty and sixty years of age, uncover his bald head,
kneel down upon the cold, dam]) ground, and receive
upon his naked and toil-worn shoulders more than
thirty lashes at the time. Colonel Lloyd had three
sons — Edward, Murray, and Daniel, — and three
sons-in-law, Mr. Winder, Mr. Nicholson, and Mr.

9

18 NARRATIVE OF THE

Lowndes. All of these lived at the Great House
Farm, and enjoyed the luxury of whipping the servants
when they pleased, from old Barney down to William
Wilkes, the coach-driver. I have seen Winder make
one of the house-servants stand off from him a suitable
distance to be touched with the end of his whip, and
at every stroke raise great ridges upon his back.

To describe the wealth of Colonel" Lloyd would be
• almost equal to describing the riches of Job. He kept
from ten to fifteen house-servants. He was said to
own a thousand slaves, and I think this estimate <quite
within the truth. Colonel Lloyd owned so many that
he did not know them when he saw them ; nor did all
the slaves of the out-farms know him. It is reported
of him, that, while riding along the road one day, he met
a colored man, and addressed him in the usual manner
of speaking to colored people on the public highways
of the south : "Well, boy, whom do you belong to ? "
" To Colonel Lloyd," replied the slave. " Well, does
the colonel treat you well ? " " No, sir," was the
ready reply. " What, does he work you too hard ? "
" Yes, sir." " Well, don't he give you enough to
eat ? " " Yes, sir, he gives me enough, such as it is."

The colonel, after ascertaining where the slave be-
longed, rode on ; the man also went on about his
business, not dreaming that he had been conversing
with his master. He thought, said, and heard nothing
more of the matter, until two or three weeks after-
wards. The poor man was then informed by his over-
seer that, for having found fault with his master, he
was now to be sold to a Georgia trader. He was im-
mediately chained and handcuffed ; and thus, without a

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 19

moment's warning, he was snatched away, and forever
sundered, from his family and friends, by a hand more
unrelenting than death. This is the penalty of telling
the truth, of telling the simple truth, in answer to a
series of plain questions.

It is partly in consequence of such facts, that slaves,
when inquired of as to their condition and the charac-
ter of their masters, almost universally say they arc-
contented, and that their masters are kind. The slave-
holders have been known to send in spies among their
slaves, to ascertain their views and feelings in regard to
their condition. The frequency of this has had the
effect to establish among the slaves the maxim, that a
still tongue makes- a wise head. They suppress the
truth rather than take the consequences of telling it,
and in so doing prove themselves a part of the human
family. If they have any thing to say of their mas-
ters, it is generally in their masters' favor, especially
when speaking to an untried man. I have been fre-
quently asked, when a slave, if I had a kind master,
and do not remember ever to have given a negative
answer; nor did I, in pursuing this course, consider
myself as uttering what was absolutely false; for I
always measured the kindness of my master by the
standard of kindness set up among slaveholders around
us. Moreover, slaves are like other people, and imbibe
prejudices quite common to others. They think their
own better than that of others. Many, under the influ-
ence of this prejudice, think their own masters are
better than the masters of other slaves ; and this, too,
in some cases, when the very reverse is true. Indeed,
it is not uncommon for slaves even to fall out and

20 NARRATIVE OF THE

quarrel among themselves about the relative goodness
of their masters, each contending for the superior
goodness of his own over that of the others. At the
very same time, they mutually execrate their masters
when viewed separately. It was so on our plantation.
When Colonel Lloyd's slaves met the slaves of Jacob
Jepson, they seldom parted without a quarrel about
their masters ; Colonel Lloyd's slaves contending that
he was the richest, and Mr. Jepson's slaves that he
was the smartest, and most of a man. Colonel Lloyd's
slaves would boast his ability to buy and sell Jacob
Jepson. Mr. Jepson's slaves would boast his ability to
whip Colonel Lloyd. These quarrels would almost
always end in a fight between the parties, and those
that whipped were supposed to have gained the point
at issue. They seemed to think that the greatness of
their masters was transferable to themselves. It was
considered as being bad enough to be a slave ; but to
be a poor man's slave was deemed 'a disgrace indeed !

CHAPTER IV.

Mr. Hopkins remained but a short time in the office
of overseer. Why his career was so short, I do not
know, but suppose he lacked the necessary severity to
suit Colonel Lloyd. Mr. Hopkins was succeeded by
Mr. Austin Gore, a man possessing, in an eminent
degree, all those traits of character indispensable to

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 21

what is called a first-rate overseer. Mr. Gore had served
Colonel Lloyd, in the capacity of overseer, upon one of
the out-farms, and had shown himself worthy of the high
station of overseer upon the home or Great House Farm.
Mr. Gore was proud, ambitious, and persevering.
He was artful, cruel, and obdurate. He was just the
man for such a place, and it was just the place for
such a man. It afforded scope for the full exercise of
all his powers, and he seemed to be perfectly at home
in it. He was one of those who could torture the
slightest look, word, or gesture, on the part4 of the
slave, into impudence, and would treat it accordingly.
There must be no answering back to him ; no expla-
nation was allowed a slave,' showing himself to have
been wrongfully accused. Mr. Gore acted fully up
to the maxim laid down by slaveholders, — "It is
better that a dozen slaves suffer under the lash, than
that the overseer should be convicted, in the presence
of the slaves, of hawing been at fault." No matter how
innocent a slave might be — it availed him nothing,
when accused by Mr. Gore of -any misdemeanor. To
be accused was to be convicted, and to be convicted
was to be punished ; the one always following the other
with immutable certainty. To escape punishment was
to escape accusation ; and few slaves had the fortune to
do either, under the overseership of Mr. Gore. He
was just proud enough to demand the most debasing
homage of the slave, and quite servile enough to
crouch, himself, at the feet of the master. He was
ambitious enough to be contented with nothing short
of the highest rank of overseers, and persevering
enough to reach the height of his ambition. He was

22 NARRATIVE OF THE

cruel enough to inflict the severest punishment, artful
enough to descend to the lowest trickery, and obdurate
enough to be insensible to the voice of a reproving
conscience. He was, of all the overseers, the most
dreaded by the slaves. His presence was painful ; his
eye flashed confusion ; and seldom was his sharp,
shrill voice heard, without producing horror and trem-
bling in their ranks.

Mr. Gore was a grave man, and, though a young
man, he indulged in no jokes, said no funny words,
seldom 'smiled. His words were in perfect keeping
with his looks, and his looks were in perfect keeping
with his words. Overseers will sometimes indulge in
a witty word, even with the slaves; not so with Mr.
Gore. He spoke but to command, and commanded
but to be obeyed ; he dealt sparingly with his words,
and bountifully with his whip, never using the former
where the latter would answer as well. When he
whipped, he seemed to do so from Wsense of duty, and
feared no consequences. He did nothing reluctantly,
no matter how disagreeable ; always at his post, never
inconsistent. He never promised but to fulfil. He
was, in a word, a man of the most inflexible firmness
and stone-like coolness.

His savage barbarity was equalled only by the con-
summate coolness with which he committed the grossest
and most savage deeds upon the slaves under his charge.
Mr. Gore once undertook to whip one of Colonel Lloyd's
slaves, by the name of Demby. He had given Demby
but few stripes, when, to get rid of the scourging, he
ran and plunged himself into a creek, and stood there
at the depth of his shoulders, refusing to come out.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 'S-i

Mr. Gore told him that he would give him three calls,
and that, if he did not come out at the third call, he
would shoot him. The first call was given. Demby
made no response, but stood his ground. The second
and third calls were given with the same result. Mr.
Gore then, without consultation or deliberation with
any one, not even giving Demby an additional call,
raised his musket to his face, taking deadly aim at his
standing victim, and in an instant poor Demby was no
more. His mangled body sank out of sight, and blood
and brains marked the water where he had stood.

A thrill of horror flashed through every soul upon the
plantation, excepting Mr. Gore. He alone seemed cool
and collected. He was asked by Colonel Lloyd and
my old master, why he resorted to this extraordinary
expedient. His reply was, (as well as I can remem-
ber,) that Demby had become unmanageable. He was
setting a dangerous example to the other slaves, — one
which, if suffered to pass without some such demon-
stration on his part* would finally lead to the total sub-
version of all rule and order upon the plantation. He
argued that if one slave refused to be corrected, and
escaped with his life, the oth >Uves would soon copy
the example; the result of which would be, the free-
dom of the slaves, and the enslavement of the whites.
Mr. Gore's defence was satisfactory. lie was contin-
ued in his station as overseer upon the home plantation
His fame as an overseer went abroad. 1 lis horrid crime
was not even submitted tu judicial investigation. It
was committed in the presence of slaves, and they of
course could neither institute a suit, nor testify against
him ; and thus the guilty perpetrator of one of the

24 NARRATIVE OF* THE

bloodiest and most foul murders goes unwhipped of
justice, and uncensured by the community in which he
lives. Mr. Gore lived in St. Michael's, Talbot county,
Maryland, when I left there ; and if he is still alive, he
very probably lives there now ; and if so, he is now, as
he was then, as highly esteemed and as much re-
spected as though his guilty soul had not been stained
with his brother's blood.

I speak advisedly when I say this,-* that killing a
slave, or any colored person, in Talbot county, Mary-
land, is not treated as a crime, either by the courts
or the community. Mr. Thomas Lanman, of St.
Michael's, killed two slaves, one of whom he killed with
a hatchet, by knocking his brains out. He used to
boast of the commission of the awful and bloody deed.
I have heard him do so laughingly, saying, among
other things, that he was the only benefactor of his
country in the company, and that when others would
do as much as he had done, we should be relieved of
" the d d niggers."

The wife of Mr. Giles Hick, living but a short dis-
tance from where I used to live, murdered my wife's
cousin, a young girl ^ptween fifteen and sixteen years
of age, mangling her person in the most horrible man-
ner, breaking her nose and breastbone with a stick,
so that the poor girl expired in a few hours afterward.
She was immediately buried, but had not been in her
untimely grave but a few hours before she was taken
up and examined by the coroner, who decided that she
had come to her death by severe beating. The offence
for which this girl was thus murdered was this : —
She had been set that night to mind Mrs. Hick's baby,

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 25

and during the night she fell asleep, and the baby
cried. She, having lost her rest for several nights pre-
vious, did not hear the crying. They were both in the
room with Mrs. Hicks. Mrs. Hicks, finding the girl
slow to move, jumped from her bed, seized an oak
stick of wood by the fireplace, and with it broke the
girl's nose and breastbone, and thus ended her life. I
will not say that this most horrid murder produced no
sensation in the* community. It did produce sensation,
but not enough to bring the murderess to punishment.
There was a warrant issued for her arrest, but it was
never served. Thus she escaped not only punishment,
but even the pain of being arraigned before a court for
her horrid crime.

Whilst I am detailing bloody deeds which took place
during my stay on Colonel Lloyd's plantation, I will
briefly narrate another, which occurred about the same
time as the murder of Demby by Mr. Gore.

Colonel Lloyd's slaves were in the habit of spending
a part of their nights and Sundays in fishing for
oysters, and in this way made up the deficiency of
their scanty allowance. An old man belonging to
Colonel Lloyd, while thus engaged, happened to get
beyond the limits of Colonel Lloyd's, and on the prem-
ises of Mr. Beal Bondly. At this trespass, Mr. Bondly
took offence, and with his musket came down to the
shore, and blew its deadly contents into the poor old
man.

Mr. Bondly came over to see Colonel Lloyd the
next day, whether to pay him for his property, or to
justify himself in what he had done, I know not. At
any rate, this whole fiendish transaction was soon

26 NARRATIVE OF THE

hushed up. There was very little said about it at all,
and nothing done. It was a common saying, even
among little white boys, that it was worth a half-cent
to kill a " nigger," and a half-cent to bury one.

CHAPTER V.

As to my own treatment while I lived on Colonel
Lloyd's plantation, it was very similar to -that of the
other slave children. I was not old enough to work in
the field, and there being little else than field work to
do, I had a great deal of leisure time. The most I
had to do was to drive up the cows at evening, keep
the fowls out of the garden, keep the front yard clean,
and run of errands for my old master's daughter,
Mre. Lucretia Auld. The most of my leisure time I
spent in helping Master Daniel Lloyd in finding his
birds, after he had shot them. My connection with
Master Daniel was of some advantage to me. He be-
came quite attached to me, and was a sort of protector
of me. He would not allow the older boys to impose
upon me, and would divide his cakes with me.

I was seldom whipped by my old master, and suf-
fered little from any thing else than hunger and cold.
I suffered much from hunger, but much more from
cold. In hottest summer and coldest winter, I was kept
almost naked — no shoes, no stockings, no jacket, no
trousers, nothing on but a coarse tow linen shirt, reach

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 27

ing only to my knees. I had no bed. I must have
perished with cold, but that, the coldest nights, I used to
steal a bag which was used for carrying corn to the
mill. I would crawl into this bag, and there sleep on
the cold, damp, clay floor, with my head in and feet
out. My feet have been so cracked with the frost, that
the pen with which I am writing might be laid in the
gashes.

We were not regularly allowanced. Our food was
coarse corn meal boiled. This was caHed mush. It
was put into a large wooden tray or trough, and set
down upon the ground. The children were then
called, like so many pigs, and like so many pigs they
would come and devour the mush ; some with oyster-
shells, others with pieces of shingle, some with naked
hands, and none with spoons. He that ate fastest got
most ; he that was strongest secured the best place ;
and few left the trough satisfied.

I was probably between seven and eight years old
when I left Colonel Lloyd's plantation. I left it with
joy. I shall never forget the ecstasy with which I re-
ceived the intelligence that my old master (Anthony)
had determined to let me go to Baltimore, to live with
Mr. Hugh Auld, brother to my old master's son-in-law,
Captain Thomas Auld. I received this information
about three days before my departure. They were
three of the happiest days I ever enjoyed. I spent the
most part of all these three days" in the creek, washing
off the plantation scurf, and preparing myself for my
departure.

The pride of appearance which this would indicate
was not my own. I spent the time in washing, not so

28 NARRATIVE OF THE

much because I wished to, but because Mrs. Lucretia
had told me I must get all the dead skin off my feet
and knees before I could go to Baltimore ; for the
people in Baltimore were very cleanly, and would
laugh at me if I looked dirty. Besides, she was going
to give me a pair of trousers, which I should not put
on unless I got all the dirt off me. The thought of
owning a pair of trousers was great indeed ! It was
almost a sufficient motive, not only to make me take
off what would be called by pig-drovers the mange,
but the skin itself. I went at it in good earnest, work-
ing for the first time with the hope of reward.

The ties that ordinarily bind children to their homes
were all suspended in my case. I found no severe
trial in my departure. My home was charmless ; it
was not home to me ; on parting from it, I could not
feel that I was leaving any thing which I could have
enjoyed by staying. My mother was dead, my grand-
mother lived far off, so that I seldom saw her. I had
two sisters and one brother, that lived in the same
house with me ; but the early separation of us from
our mother had well nigh blotted the fact of our rela-
tionship from our memories. I looked for home else-
where, and was confident of finding none which I
should relish less than the one which I was leaving.
If, however, I found in my new home hardship, hun-
ger, whipping, and nakedness, I had the consolation
that I should not have escaped any one of them by
staying. Having already had more than a taste of
them in the house of my old master, and having en-
dured them there, I very naturally inferred my ability
to endure them elsewhere, and especially at Baltimore ;

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 29

for I had something of the feeling about Baltimore that
is expressed in the proverb, that " being hanged in
England is preferable to dying a natural death in Ire-
land.'" I had the strongest desire to see Baltimore.
Cousin Tom, though not fluent in speech, had inspired
me with that desire by his eloquent description of the
place. I could never point out any thing at the Great
House, no matter how beautiful or powerful, but that
he had seen something at Baltimore far exceeding, both
in beauty and strength, the object which I pointed out
to him. Even the Great House itself, with all its
pictures, was far inferior to many buildings in Bal-
timore. So strong was mv desire, that I thought a
gratification of* it would fully compensate for whatever
loss of comfofts I should sustain by the exchange.
I left wiAout a regret, and with the highest hopes of
future happineA

We sailed out of Mile^jKiver for Baltimore on a
Saturday morning. I remember only the day of the
♦veek, for at that time I had no knowledge of the days
of the month, nor the months of the year. On setting
sail, I walked aft, and gave to Colonel Lloyd's plantation
what I hoped would be the last look. I then placed
myself in the bows of the sloop, and there spent the
remainder of the day in looking ahead, interesting
myself in what was in the distance rather than in things
near by or behind.

In the afternoon of that day, we reached Annapolis,
the capital of the State. We stopped but a few mo-
ments, so that I had no time to go on shore. It was
the first large town that I had ever seen, and though it
would look small compared with some of our New

30 NARRATIVE OF THE

England factory villages, I thought it a wonderful
place for its size — more imposing even than the
Great House Farm !

We arrived at Baltimore early^n Sunday morning,
landing at Smith's Wharf, not far from Bowley's
Wharf. We had on board the sloop a large flock of
sheep ; and after aiding in driving them to the slaughter-
house of "Mr. Curtis on Louden Slater's Hill, I was
conducted by Rich, one of the hands belonging on
board of the sloop, to my new home in Alliciana
Street, near Mr. Gardner's ship-yard, on Fells Point.

Mr. and Mrs. Auld were both' at home, and met me
at the door with their little son Thomas, to take care
of whom I had been given. And here**I saw what I
had never seen before ; it was a whitfr face beaming
with the most kindly emotions ; it was the fa*e of my
new mistress, Sophia i^jld. I wish j^could describe
the rapture that flashed' trough my soul as I beheld it.
It was a new and strange sight to me, brightening up
my pathway with the light of happiness. Little
Thomas was told, there was his Freddy, — and I was
told to take care of little Thomas ; and thus I entered
upon the duties of my new home with the most cheer-
ing prospect ahead.

I look upon my departure from Colonel Lloyd's
plantation as one of the most interesting events of my
life. It is possible, and even quite probable, that but
for the mere circumstance of being removed from
that plantation to Baltimore, I should have to-day,
instead of being here seated by my own table, in the
enjoyment of freedom and the happiness of home,
writing this Narrative, been confined in the galling

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 31

chains of slavery. Going to live at Baltimore laid
the foundation, and opened the gateway, to all my
subsequent prosperity. * I have ever regarded it as the
first plain manifestation of that kind providence which
has ever since attended me, and marked my life with
so many favors. I regarded the selection of myself as
being somewhat remarkable. There were a number
of slave children that might have been sent from the
plantation to Baltimore. There were those younger,
those older, and those of the same age. I was chosen
from among them all, and was the first, last, and only
choice.

I may be deemed superstitious, and even egotistical,
in regarding this event as a special interposition of
divine Providence in my favor. But I should be
false to the earliest sentiments of my soul, if I sup-
pressed the opinion. I prefer to be true to myself,
even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of
others, rather than to be false, and incur my own ab-
horrence. From my earliest recollection, I date the
entertainment of a deep conviction that slavery would
not always be able to hold me within its foul embrace ;
and in the darkest hours of my career in slavery, this
living word of faith and spirit of hope departed not
from me, but remained like ministering angels to cheer
me through the gloom. This good spirit was from
God, and to him I offer thanksgiving and praise.

32 NARRATIVE OF THE

CHAPTER VI.

My new mistress proved to be all she appeared
when I first met her at the door, — a woman of the
kindest heart and finest feelings. She had never had a
slave under her control previously to myself, and prior
to her marriage she had been dependent upon her own
industry for a living. She was by trade a weaver ; and
by constant application to her business, she had been in
a good degree preserved from the blighting and dehu-
manizing effects of slavery. I was utterly astonished
at her goodness. I scarcely knew how to behave
towards her. She was entirely unlike any other white
woman I had ever seen. I could not approach her as
I was accustomed to approach other white ladies. My
early instruction was all out of place. The crouching
servility, usually so acceptable a quality in a slave,
did not answer when manifested toward her. Her
favor was not gained by it ; she seemed to be dis-
turbed by it. She did not deem it impudent or unman-
nerly for a slave to look her in the face. The mean-
est slave was put fully at ease in her presence, and
none left without feeling better for having seen her.
Her face was made of heavenly smiles, and her voice
of tranquil music.

But, alas ! this kind heart had but a short time to
remain such. The fatal poison of irresponsible power
was already in her hands, and soon commenced its
infernal work. That cheerful eye, under the influence
of slavery, soon became red with rage ; that voice,

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 33

marie all of sweet accord, changed to one of harsh
horrid discord ; and that angelic face gave place
to that of a demon.

Very soon after I went to live with Mr. and Mrs.
Auld, she verv kindlv commenced to teach me the
A, B, C. After I had learned this, she assisted me in
learning to spell words of three or four letters. Just
at this point of my progress, Mr. Auld found out what
was going on, and at once forbade Mrs. Auld to instruct
me further, telling her, among other things, that it was
unlawful, as well as unsafe, to teach a, slave to read.
To use his own words, further, he said, " If you give a
nigger an inch, he will take an ell. A nigger should
know nothing but to obev his master — to do as he is
told to do. Learning would spoil the best nigger in
the world. Now," said he, " if you teach that nigg( i
(speaking of myself) how to read, there would be no
keeping him. It would forever unfit him to be a slave.
He would at once become unmanageable, and of nc
value to his master. As to himself, it could do him no
good, but a great deal of harm. It would make him
discontented and unhappy." These words sank deep
into my heart, stirred up sentiments within that lay
slumbering, and called into existence an entirely new
train of thought. It was a new and special revelation,
explaining dark and mysterious things, with which my
youthful understanding had struggled, but struggled in
vain. I now understood what had been to me a most
perplexing difficulty — to wit, the white man's power to
enslave the black man. It was a grand achievement,
and I prized it highly. From that moment, 1 under-
stood the pathway from slavery to freedom. It was
3

oi NARRATIVE OF THE

just what I wanted, and I got it at a time when I the
least expected it. Whilst I was saddened by the
thought of losing the aid of my kind mistress, I was
gladdened by the invaluable instruction which, by the
merest accident, I had gained from my master.
Though conscious of the difficulty of learning without
a teacher, I set out with high hope, and a fixed pur-
pose, at whatever cost of trouble, to learn how to read.
The very decided manner with which he spoke, and
strove to impress his wife with the evil consequences
of giving me instruction, served to convince me that
he was deeply sensible of the -truths he was uttering.
It gave me the best assurance that I might rely with
the utmost confidence on the results which, he said,
would flow from teaching me to read. What he most
dreaded, that I most desired. What he most loved,
that I most hated. That which to him was a great
evil, to be carefully shunned, was to me a great good,
to be diligently sought ; and the argument which he so
warmly urged, against my learning to read, only served
to inspire me with a desire and determination to learn.
In learning to read, I owe almost as much to the bitter
opposition of my master, as to the kindly aid of my
mistress. I acknowledge the benefit of both.

I had resided but a short time in Baltimore before I
observed a marked difference, in the treatment of
slaves, from that which I had witnessed in the country.
A city slave is almost a freeman, compared with a
slave on the plantation. He is much better fed and
clothed, and enjoys privileges altogether unknown to
the slave on the plantation. There is a vestige of de-
cency, a sense of shame, that does much to curb and

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 35

check those outbreaks of atrocious cruelty so com-
monly enacted upon the plantation. He is a desperate
slaveholder, who will shock the humanity of his non-
slaveholding neighbors with the cries of his lacerated
slave. Few are willing to incur the odium attaching to
the reputation of being a cruel master ; and above all
things, they would not be known as not giving a slave
enough to eat. Every city slaveholder is anxious to
have it known of him, that he feeds his slaves well ;
and it is due to them to say, that most of them do give
their slaves enough to eat. There are, however, some
painful exceptions to this rule. Directly opposite to us,
on Philpot Street, lived Mr. Thomas Hamilton. He
owned two slaves. Their names were Henrietta and
Mary. Henrietta was about twenty-two years of age,
Mary was about fourteen ; and of all the mangled and
emaciated creatures I ever looked -upon, these two
were the most so. His heart must be harder than
stone, that could look upon these unmoved. The head,
neck, and shoulders of Mary were literally cut to
pieces. I have frequently felt her head, and found
it nearly covered with festering sores, caused by the
lash of her cruel mistress. I do not know that her
master ever whipped her, but I have been an eye-witness
to the cruelty of Mrs. Hamilton. I used to be in Mr.
Hamilton's house nearly every day. Mrs. Hamilton
used to sit in a large chair in the middle of the room,
with a heavy cowskin always by her side, and scarce
an hour passed during the day but was marked by the
blood of one of these slaves. The girls seldom passed
her without her saying, " Move faster, you black gip ! "
at the same time giving them a blow with the cow-

36 NARRATIVE OF THE

skin over the head or shoulders, often drawing the
blood. She would then say, " Take that, you black
gip ! " — continuing, " If you don't move faster, I'll
move you ! " Added to the cruel lashings to which
these slaves were subjected, they were kept nearly
half-starved. They seldom knew what it was to eat a
full meal. I have seen Mary contending with the pigs
for the offal thrown into the street. So much was
Mary kicked and cut to pieces, that she was oftener
called "pecked" than by her name.

CHAPTER VII.

I lived in Master Hugh's family about seven years.
During this time, I succeeded in learning to read and
write. In accomplishing this, I was compelled to resort
to various stratagems. I had no regular teacher. My
mistress, who had kindly commenced to instruct me,
had, in compliance with the advice and direction of her
husband, not only ceased to instruct, but had set her
face against my being instructed by any one else. It
is due, however, to my mistress to say of her, that she
did not adopt this course of treatment immediately.
She at first lacked the depravity indispensable to shut-
ting me up in mental darkness. It was at least neces-
sary for her to have some training in the exercise of
irresponsible power, to make her equal to the task of
treating me as though I were a brute.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 37

My mistress was, as I have said, a kind and tender-
hearted woman ; and in the simplicity of her soul she
commenced, when I first went to live with her, to treat
me as she supposed one human being ought to treat
another. In entering upon the duties of a slaveholder,
she did not seem to perceive that I sustained to her the
relation of a mere chattel, and that for her to treat me
as a human being was not only wrong, but dangerously
so. Slavery proved as injurious to her as it did to me.
When I went there, she was a pious, warm, and ten-
der-hearted woman. There was no sorrow or suffer-
ing for which she had not a tear. She had bread for
the hungry, clothes for the naked, and comfort for
every mourner that came within her reach. Slavery
soon proved its ability to divest her of these heavenly
qualities. Under its influence, the tender heart became
stone, and the lamblike disposition gave way to one of
tiger-like fierceness. The first step in her downward
course was in her ceasing to instruct me. She now
commenced to practise her husband's precepts. She
finally became even more violent in her opposition
than her husband himself. She was not satisfied with
simply doing as well as he had commanded ; she
seemed anxious to do better. Nothing seemed to
make her more angry than to see me with a news-
paper. She seemed to think that here lay the danger.
I have had her rush at me with a face made all up of
fury, and snatch from me a newspaper, in a manner
that fully revealed her apprehension. She was an apt
woman ; and a little experience soon demonstrated, to
her satisfaction, that education and slavery were in-
compatible with each other.

38 NARRATIVE OF THE

From this lime I was most narrowly watched. If I
was in a separate room any considerable length of time,
I was sure to be suspected of having a book, and was
at once called to give an account of myself. All this,
however, was too late. The first step had been taken.
Mistress, in teaching me the alphabet, had given me the
inch, and no precaution could prevent me from taking
the ell

The plan which I adopted, and the one by which I
was most successful, was that of making friends of all
the little white boys whom I met in the street. As
many of these as I could, I converted into teachers.
With their kindly aid, obtained at different times and
in different places, I finally succeeded in learning to
read. When I was sent of errands, I always took my
book with me, and by going one part of my errand
quickly, I found time to get a lesson before my return.
I used also to carry bread with me, enough of which
was always in the house, and to which I was always
welcome ; for I was much better off in this regard than
many of the poor white children in our neighborhood.
This bread I used to bestow upon the hungry little
urchins, who, in return, would give me that more valu-
able bread of knowledge. I am strongly tempted to
give the names of two or three of those little boys, as
a testimonial of the gratitude and affection I bear them ;
but prudence forbids ; — not that it would injure me,
but it might embarrass them ; for it is almost an unpar-
donable offence to teach slaves to read in this Christian
country. It is enough .to say of the dear little fellows,
that they lived on Philpot Street, very near Durgin and
Bailey's ship-yard. I used to talk this matter of slavery

LIFE OF PH ASS. 39

over with them. I would so me tin to them, I

wished I could be as free us they would be when they
got to be men. "You will be free i are

twenty-one, but. I am a slave for life ! Have not 1 us
good a right to be free as you have ? " These words
used to trouble them ; they would express for ine the
liveliest sympathy, and console me with the hope that
something would occur by which I might be free.

I was now about twelve years old, and the thought
of being a slave for life began to bear heavily upon
my heart. Just about this time, I got hold of a book en-
titled " The Columbian Orator." Every opportunity
I got, I used 4o read this book. Among much of other
interesting matter, I found in it a dialogue between a
master and his slave. The slave was represented as
having run away from his master three times. The
dialogue represented the conversation which took place
between them, when the slave was retaken the third
time. In this dialogue, the whole argument in behalf
of slavery was brought forward by the master, all of
which was disposed of by the slave. The slave was
made to say some very smart as well as impressive
things in reply to his ma ster— things which had the
desired though unexpected effect ; for the conversation
resulted in the voluntary emancipation of the slave on
the part of the master.

In the same book, I met with one of Sherid;
mighty speeches on and in behalf of Catholic eman-
cipation. These were choice documents to me. I
read them over and over again with unabated interest.
They gave tongue to interesting thoughts of my own
soul, which had frequently flashed through my mind,

40 NARRATIVE OF THE

and died away for want of utterance. The moral
which I gained from the dialogue was the power of
truth over the conscience of even a slaveholder. What
I got from Sheridan was a bold denunciation of
slavery, and a powerful vindication of human rights.
The reading of these documents enabled me to utter
my thoughts, and to meet the arguments brought for-
ward to sustain slavery ; but while they relieved me
of one difficulty, they brought on another even more
painful than the one of which I was relieved. The more
I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my en-
slavers. I could regard them in no other light than a
band of successful robbers, who had left their homes,
and gone to Africa, and stolen us from our homes, and
in a strange land reduced us to slavery. I loathed
them as being the meanest as well as the most wicked
of men. As I read and contemplated the subject, be-
hold ! that very discontentment which Master Hugh had
predicted would follow my learning to read had already
come, to torment and sting my soul to unutterable
anguish. As I writhed under it, I would at times feel
that learning to read had been a curse rather than a
blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched
condition, without the remedy. It opened my eyes to
the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out.
In moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for
their stupidity. I have often wished myself a beast.
I preferred the condition of the meanest reptile to my
own. Any thing, no matter what, to get rid of think-
ing ! It was this everlasting thinking of my condition
that tormented me. There was no getting rid of it.
It was pressed upon me by every object within sight or

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 41

hearing, animate or inanimate. The silver trump of
freedom had roused my soul to eternal wakefulness.
Freedom now appeared, to disappear no more forever.
It was heard in every sound, and seen in every thing.
It was ever present to torment me with a sense of my
wretched condition. I saw nothing without seeing it,
I heard nothing without hearing it, and felt nothing
without feeling it. It looked from every star, it smiled
in every calm, hreathed in every wind, and moved in
every storm.

I often found myself regretting my own existence,
and wishing myself dead ; and but for the hope of
being free, I have no doubt but that I should have
killed myself, or done something for which I should
have been killed. While in this state of mind, I was
eager to hear any one speak of slavery. I was a ready
listener. Every little while, I could hear something
about the abolitionists. It was some time before I found
what the word meant. It was always used in such
connections as to make it an interesting word to me.
If a slave, ran away and succeeded in getting clear, or
if a slave killed his master, set fire to a barn, or did
any thing very wrong in the mind of a slaveholder, it
was spoken of as the fruit of abolition. Hearing the
word in this connection very often, I set about learning
what it meant. The dictionaiy afforded me little or no
help. I found it was " the act of abolishing ; " but
then I did not know what was to be abolished. Here
I was perplexed. I did not dare to ask any one about
its meaning, for I was satisfied that it was something
they wanted me to know very little about. After a
Datient waiting, I got one of our city papers, contain-

42 NARRATIVE OF THE

ing an account of the number of petitions from the
north, praying for the abolition of slavery in the Dis-
trict of Columbia, and of the slave trade between the
States. From this time I understood the words abo-
lition and abolitionist, and always drew near when
that word was spoken, expecting to hear something of
importance to myself and fellow-slaves. The light
broke in upon me by degrees. I went one day down
on the wharf of Mr. Waters; and seeing two Irishmen
unloading a scow of stone, I went, unasked, and helped
them. When we had finished, one of them came to me
and asked me if I were a slave. I told him I was. He
asked, " Are ye a slave for life ? " I told him that I
was. The good Irishman seemed to be deeply affected
by the statement. He said to the other that it was a
pity so fine a little fellow as myself should be a slave
for life. He said it was a shame to hold me. They
both advised me to run away to the north ; that I should
find friends there, and that I should be free. I pre-
tended not to be interested in what they said, and
treated them as if I did not understand them ; for I
feared they might be treacherous. White men have
been known to encourage slaves to escape, and then,
to get the reward, catch them and return them to their
masters. I was afraid that these seemingly good men
might use me so ; but I nevertheless remembered
their advice, and from that time I resolved to run
away. I looked forward to a time at which it would
be safe for me to escape. I was too young to think of
doing so immediately ; besides, I wished to learn how
to write, as I might have occasion to write my own
pass. I consoled myself with the hope that I should

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 43

one day find a good chance. Meanwhile, I would
learn to write.

The idea as to how I might learn to write was sug-
gested to me by being in Durgin and Bailey's ship-
yard, and frequently seeing the ship carpenters, after
hewing, and getting a piece of timber ready for use,
write on the timber the name of that part of the ship
for which it was intended. When a piece of timber
was intended for the larboard side, it would be marked
thus — " L." When a piece was for the starboard
side, it would be marked thus — " S." A piece for
the larboard side forward, would be marked thus —
" L. F." When a piece was for starboard side for-
ward, it would be marked thus — " S. F." For lar-
board aft, it would be marked thus — " L. A." For
starboard aft, it would be marked thus — " S. A." I
soon learned the names of these letters, and for what
they were intended when placed upon a piece of tim-
ber in the ship-yard. I immediately commenced copy-
ing them, and in a short time was able to make the
four letters named. After that, when I met with any
boy who I knew could write, I would tell him I could
write as well as he. The next word would be, " I
don't believe you. Let me see you try it." I would
then make the letters which I had been so fortunate as
to learn, and ask him to beat that. In this way I got
a good many lessons in writing, which it is quite pos-
sible I should never have gotten in any other way.
During this time, my copy-book was the board fence,
brick wall, and pavement; my pen and ink was a lump
of chalk. With these, I learned mainly how to write.
1 then commenced and continued copying the Italics in

44: nrvE of the

spelling Book, until I could make them all
without looking on the book. By this time, my little
er Thomas had gone to school, and learned how
to write, and had written over a number of copy-books.
These had been brought home, and shown to some of
our near neighbors, and then laid aside. My
used to go to class meeting at the Wilk Street meeting-
house even" Monday afternoon, and leave me to take
care of the house. When left thus, I used to spend
the time in writing in the spaces left in Master
Thomases copy-book, copying what he had written. I
continued to do this until I could write a hand very
similar to that of Master Thomas. Thus, after a long,

tedious effort for years, I finallv succeeded in learning

—

how to write.

CHAPTER VIII.

bn a very short time after I went to live at Baltimore,
my old masters youngest son Richard died ; and in
about three years and six months after his death, my
old master, Captain Anthony, died, leaving only his
Andrew, and daughter, Lucretia, to share his
estate. He died while on a visit to see his daughter at
Hillsborough. Cut off thus unexpectedly, he left no
will as to the disposal of his property. It was there-
fore necessary to have a valuation of the prop
that it might be equally divided between Mrs. Lucretia
and Master Andrew. I was immediately sent for, to

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 15

be valued with ibe other property. Here again my
feelings rose up in detestation of slavery. I had now
a new conception of my degraded condition. Prior
to this, I had become, if not insensible to my lot, at
least partly so. I left Baltimore with a young heart
overborne with sadness, and a soul full of apprehen-
sion. I took passage with Captain Rowe, in the
schooner Wild Gat, and, after a sail of about twenty-
four hours, I found myself near the place of my birth.
I had now been absent from it almost, if not quite,
five years. I, however, remembered the place very
well. I was only about five years old when I left it,
to go and live with my old master on Colonel Lloyd's
plantation ; so that I was now between ten and eleven
years old.

We were all ranked together at the valuation.
Men and women, old and young, married and single,
were ranked with horses, sheep, and swine. There
were horses and men, cattle and women, pigs and
children, all holding the same rank in the scale of
being, and were all subjected to the same narrow ex-
amination. Silvery-headed age and sprightly youth,
maids and matrons, had to undergo the same indelicate
inspection. At this moment, I saw more clearly than
ever the brutalizing effects of slavery upon both slave
and slaveholder.

After the valuation, then came the division. I have
no language to express the high excitement and deep
anxiety which were felt among us poor slaves during
this time. Our fate for. life was now to be decided.
We had no more voice in that decision than the brutes
among whom we were ranked. A single word from

46 NARRATIVE OF THE

the white men was enough — against all our wishes,
prayers, and entreaties — to sunder forever the dearest
friends, dearest kindred, and strongest ties known to
human beings. In addition to the pain of separation,
there was the horrid dread of falling into the hands of
Master Andrew. He was known to us all as being a
most cruel wretch, — a common drunkard, who had,
by his reckless mismanagement and profligate dissipa-
tion, already wasted a large portion of his father's
property. We all felt that we might as well be sold at
once to the Georgia traders, as to pass into his hands ;
for we knew that that would be our inevitable con-
dition,— a condition held by us all in the utmost horror
and dread.

I suffered more anxiety than most of my fellow-
slaves. I had known what it was to be kindly treated ;
they had known nothing of the kind. They, had seen
little or nothing of the world. " They were in very
deed men and women of sorrow, and acquainted with
grief. Their backs had been made familiar with the
bloody lash, so that they had become callous ; mine
was yet tender ; for while at Baltimore I got few
whippings, and few slaves could boast of a kinder mas-
ter and mistress than myself; and the thought of pass-
ing out of their hands into those of Master Andrew —
a man who, but a few days before, to give me a sample
of his bloody disposition, took my little brother by the
throat, threw him on the ground, and with the heel of
his boot stamped upon his head till the blood gushed
from his nose and ears — was well calculated to make
me anxious as to my fate. After he had committed this
savage outrage upon my brother, he turned to me, and

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 17

said that was the way he meant to serve me one of
these days, — meaning, I suppose, when I came into
his possession.

Thanks to a kind Providence, I fell to the portion of
Mrs. Lucretia, and was sent immediately back to Balti-
more, to live again in the family of Master Hugh.
Their joy at my return equalled their sorrow at my
departure. It was a glad day to me. I had escaped
a worse than lion's jaws. I was absent from Baltimore,
for the purpose of valuation and division, just about
one month, and it seemed to have been six.

Very soon after my return to Baltimore, my mistress,
Lucretia, died, leaving her husband and one child,
Amanda; and in a very short time after her death,
Master Andrew died. Now all the property of my old
master, slaves included, was in the hands of strangers,

— strangers who had ha/1 nothing to do with accumu-
lating it. Not a slave was left free. All remained
slaves, from the youngest to the oldest. If any one
thing in my experience, more than another, served to
deepen my conviction of the infernal character of
slavery, and to fill me with unutterable loathing of
slaveholders, it was their base ingratitude to my poor
old grandmother. She had served my old master faith-
fully from youth to old age. She had been the source
of all his wealth ; she had peopled his plantation with

she had become a great grandmother in his
service. She had rocked him in infancy, attended him
in childhood, served him through life, and at his death
wiped from his icy brow the cold death-sweat, and closed
his eyes forever. She was nevertheless left a slave

— a slave for life — a slave in the hands of strangers ;

48 NARRATIVE OF TfcE

and in their hands she saw her children, her grand-
children, and her great-grandchildren, divided, like so
many sheep, without being gratified with the small
privilege of a single word, as to their or her own des-
tiny. And, to cap the climax of their base ingratitude
and fiendish barbarity, my grandmother, who was now
very old, having outlived my old master and all his
children, having seen the beginning and end of all of
them, and her present owners finding she was of but
little value, her frame already racked with the pains
of old age, and complete helplessness fast stealing
over her once active limbs, they took her to the woods,
built her a little hut, put up a- little mud-chimney; and
then made her welcome t<5.. the privilege of supporting
herself there in perfect loneliness ; thus virtually turn-
ing her out to die ! If my poor old grandmother now
lives, she lives to suffer in utter loneliness ; she lives to
remember and mourn over trfe loss of children, the
loss of grandchildren, and the loss of great-grandchil-
dren. They are, in the language of the slave's poet,

Whittier, —

•

" Gone, gone, sold and gone

To the rice swamp dank and lone,

Where the slave-whip ceaseless swings,

Where the noisome insect stings,

Where the fever-demon strews

Poison with the falling dews,

Where the sickly sunbeams glare

Through the hot and misty air : —
Gone, gone, sold and gone
To the rice swamp dank and lone,
From Virginia hills and waters —
Woe is me, my stolen daughters ' "

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 49

The hearth is desolate. The children, the uncon-
scious children, who once sang and danced in her
presence, are gone. She gropes her way, in the dark-
of a^e, for a drink of water. Instead of the voices
of her children, she hears by day the moans of the dove,
and by night the screams of the hideous owl. All is
gloom. The grave is at the door. And now, when
weighed down by the pains and aches of old age, when
the head inclines to the feet, when the beginning and
ending of human existence meet, and helpless infancy
and painful old age "combine together — at this time, this
most needful time, the time for the exercise of that ten-
derness and affection which ehildren only can exercise
towards a declining parent — my poor old grandmother,
the devoted mother of twelve children, is left all alone,
in yonder little hut, before a few dim embers. She
stands ; — she sits — she stagers — she falls — she

3D

groans — she dies — and there are none of her chil-
dren or grandchildren present, to wipe from her
wrinkled brow the cold sweat of death, or to place
beneath the sod her fallen remains. Will not a right-
eous God visit for these things ?

In about two years after the death of Mrs. Lucretia,
Master Thomas married his second wife. Her name
was Rowena Hamilton. She was the eldest daughter
of Mr. William Hamilton. Master now lived in St.
Mich ' lon£ after his marriage, a misun

ling took place between himself and M:i^!er 1 high :
and ■ of punishing his brother, he took me

i him to live with himself at St. Mich tel's. II
underwent another most painful separation. It, !
ever, was not' so severe as the one 1 dreaded at the
4

50 NARRATIVE OF THE

division of property; for, during this interval, a great
change had taken place in Master Hugh and his once
kind and affectionate wife. The influence of brandy
upon him, and of slavery upon her, had effected a dis-
astrous change in the characters of both ; so that, as
far as they were concerned, I thought I had little to
lose by the change. But it was not to them that I
was attached. It was to those little Baltimore boys
that I felt the strongest attachment. I had received
many good lessons from them, and was still receiving
them, and the thought of leaving them was painful
indeed. I was leaving, too, without the hope of ever
being allowed to return. Master Thomas had said he
would never let me return again. The barrier betwixt
himself and brother he considered impassable.

I then had to regret that I did not at least make the
-attempt to carry out my resolution to run away; for
the chances of success are tenfold greater from the
city than from the country.

I sailed from Baltimore for St. Michael's in the sloop
Amanda, Captain Edward Dodson. On my passage, I
paid particular attention to the direction which the
steamboats took to go to Philadelphia. I found, instead
of going down, on reaching North Point they went up
the bay, in a north-easterly direction. I deemed this
knowledge of the utmost importance. My determina-
tion to run away was again revived. I resolved to
wait only so long as the offering of a favorable oppor-
tunity. When that came, I was determined to be off.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 51

CHAPTER IX.

1 have now reached a period of my life when I can
give dates. I left Baltimore, and went to live with
Master Thomas Auld, at St. Michael's, in March, 1832.
It was now more than seven years since I lived with
him in the family of my old master, on Colonel Lloyd's
plantation. We of course were now almost entire
strangers to each other. He was to me a new master,
and I to him a new slave. I was ignorant of his tem-
per and disposition ; he was equally so of mine. A
very short time, however, brought us into full acquaint-
ance with each other. I was made acquainted with
his wife not less than with himself. They were well
matched, being equally mean and cruel. I was now,
for the first time during a space of more than seven
years, made to feel the painful gnawings of hunger —
a something which I had not experienced before since
I left Colonel Lloyd's plantation. It went hard enough
with me then, when I could look back to no period at
which I had enjoyed a sufficiency. It was tenfold
harder after living in Master Hugh's family, where I
had always had enough to eat, and of that which was
good. I have said Master Thomas was a mean man.
He was so. Not to give a slave enough to eat, is re-
garded as the most aggravated development of mean-
ness even among slaveholders. The rule is, no mat-
ter how coarse the food, only let there be enough of it.
This is the theory ; and in the part of Maryland from
which I came, it is the general practice, — though

52 LEATIVE OF THE

there are many exceptions, blaster Thomas gave us
enough of neither coarse nor fine food. There were
four slaves of us in the kitchen — my sister Eliza,
my aunt Priscilla, Henny, and myself; and we were
allowed less than a half of a bushel" of corn-meal per
week, and very little else, either in the shape of meat
or vegetables. It was not enough for us to subsist
upon. ' We were therefore reduced to the wretched
necessity of living at the expense of our neighbors.
This we did by begging and stealing, whichever came
handy in the time of need, the one being considered as
legitimate as the other. A great many times have we
poor creatures been nearly perishing with hunger,
when food in abundance lay mouldering in the safe
and smoke-house, and our pious mistress was aware of
the fact ; and yet that mistress and her husband would
kneel every morning, and pray that God would bless
them in basket and store !

Bad as all slaveholders are, we seldom meet one
destitute of every element of character commanding
respect. My master was one of this rare sort. I do
not know of one single noble act ever performed by
him. The leading trait in his character was meanness ;
and if there were any other element in his nature, it
was made subject to this. He was mean ; and, like
most other mean men, he lacked the ability to conceal
his meanness. Captain Auld was not born a slave-
holder. He had been a poor man, master only of a
Bay craft. He came into possession of all his slaves
by marriage ; and of all men, adopted slaveholders
are the worst. He was cruel, but cowardly. He
commanded without firmness. In the enforcement of

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 53

his rules, he was at times rigid, and at times lax. At
times, he spoke to his slaves with the firmness of Na-
poleon and the fury of a demon; at other times, lie
might well be mistaken for an inquirer who had lost
his way. He did nothing of himself. He might have
passed for a lion, but for his ears. In all things noble
which he attempted, his own meanness shone most
conspicuous. His airs, words, and actions, were the
airs, words, and actions of born, slaveholders, and,
being assumed, were awkward enough. He was not
even a good imitator. He possessed all the disposition
to deceive, but wanted the power. Having no re-
sources within himself, he was compelled to be the
copyist of many, and being such, he was forever the
victim of inconsistency ; and of consequence he was an
object of contempt, and was held as such even by his
slaves. The luxury of having slaves of his own to
wait upon him was something new and unprepared for.
He was a slaveholder without the ability to hold slaves.
He found himself incapable of managing his slaves
either by force, fear, or fraud. We seldom called him
" master ; " we generally called him " Captain Auld,"
and were hardly disposed to title him at all. I doubt
not that our conduct had much to do with making him
appear awkward, and of consequence fretful. Our
want of reverence for him must have perplexed him
greatly. He wished to have us call him master, but
lacked the firmness necessary to command us to do so.
His wife used to insist upon our calling him so, but to
no purpose. In August, 1832, my master att<
Methodist camp-meeting held in the Bay-side, Talbot
county, and there experienced religion. I indulged a

54 NARRATIVE OF THE

faint hope that his conversion would lead him to emanci-
pate his slaves, and that, if he did not do this, it would,
at any rate, make him more kind and humane. I was
disappointed in both these respects. It neither made
him to be humane to his slaves, nor to emancipate them.
If it had any effect on his character, it made him more
cruel and hateful in all his ways; for I believe him to
have been a much worse man after his conversion than
before. Prior to his conversion, he relied upon his
own depravity to shield and sustain him in his savage
barbarity ; but after his conversion, he found religious
sanction and support for his slave holding cruelty. He
made the greatest pretensions to piety. His house was
the house of prayer. He prayed morning, noon, and
night. He very soon distinguished himself among
his brethren, and was soon made a class-leader and
exhorter. His activity in revivals was great, and
he proved himself an instrument in the hands of the
church in converting many souls. His house was the
preachers' home. They used to take great pleasure
in coming there to put up ; for while he starved us, he
stuffed them. We have had three or four preachers
there at a time. The names of those who used to
come most frequently while I lived there, were Mr.
Storks, Mr. Ewery, Mr. Humphry, and Mr. Hickey.
I have also seen Mr. George Cookman at our house.
We slaves loved Mr. Cookman. We believed him to
be a good man. We thought him instrumental in get-
ting Mr. Samuel Harrison, a very rich slaveholder, to
emancipate his slaves ; and by some means got the im-
pression that he was laboring to effect the emancipa-
tion of all the slaves. When he was at our house, we

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 55

were sure to be called in to prayers. When the others
were there, we were sometimes called in and s<
times not. Mr. Cookman took more notice of us than
either of the other ministers. lie could not come
among us without betraying his sympathy for us, and,
stupid as we were, we had the sagacity to see it.

While I lived with my master in St. Michael's, there
was a white young man, a Mr. Wilson, who proposed
to keep a Sabbath school for the instruction of such
slaves as might be disposed to learn to read the New
Testament. We met but three times, when Mr. West
and Mr. Fairbanks, both class-leaders, .with many
others, came upon us with sticks and other missiles,
drove us off, and forbade us to meet again. Thus
ended our little Sabbath school in the pious town of
St. Michael's.

I have said my master found religious sanction for
his cruelty. As an example, I will state one of many
facts going to prove the charge. I have seen him tie
up a lame young woman, and whip her with a heavy
cowskin upon her naked shoulders, causing the warm
red blood to drip ; and, in justification of the bloody
deed, he would quote this passage of Scripture — " He
that knoweth his master's will, and doeth it not, shall
be beaten with many stripes."

Master would keep this lacerated young woman tied
up in this horrid situation four or five hours at a time.
I have known him to tie her up early in the morn-
ing, and whip her before breakfast ; leave her, go
to his store, return at dinner, and whip her again,
cutting her in the places already made raw with his
cruel lash. The secret of master's cruelty toward

56

NARRATIVE OF THE

" Henny " is found in the fact of her being almost
helpless. When quite a child, she fell into the fire,
and burned herself horribly. Her hands were so burnt
that she never got the use of them. She could do very
little but bear heavy burdens. She was to master a
bill of expense ; and as he was a mean man, she was a
constant offence to him. He seemed desirous of get-
ting the poor girl out of existence. He gave her away
once to his sister ; but, being a poor gift, she was not
disposed to keep her. Finally, my benevolent master,
to use his own "words, " set her adrift to take care of
herself." Here was a recently-converted man, hold-
ing on upon the mother, and at the same time turning
out her helpless child, to starve and die ! Master
Thomas was one of the many pious slaveholders who
hold slaves for the very charitable purpose of taking
care of them.

My master and myself had quite a number of differ-
ences. He found me unsuitable to his purpose. My
city life, he said, had had a very pernicious effect upon
me. It had almost ruined me for every good purpose,
and fitted me for every thing which was bad. One of
my greatest faults was that of letting his horse run
away, and go down to his father-in-law's farm, which
was about five miles from St. Michael's. I would then
have to go after it. My reason for this kind of care-
lessness, or carefulness, was, that I could always get
something to eat when I went there. Master William
Hamilton, my master's father-in-law, always gave his
slaves enough to eat. I never left there hungry, no
matter how great the need of my speedy return.
Master Thomas at length said he would stand it no

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 57

longer. I had lived with him nine months, during
which time he had given me a number of severe
whippings, all to no good purpose. He resolved to
put me out, as he said, to be broken ; and, for this
purpose, he let me for one year to a man named Ed-
ward Covey. Mr. Covey was a poor man, a farm-
renter. He rented the place upon which he lived, as
also the hands with which he tilled it. Mr. Covey had
acquired a very high reputation for breaking young
slaves, and this reputation was of immense value to
him. It enabled him to get his farm tilled with much
less expense to himself than he could have had it done
without such a reputation. Some slaveholders thought
it not much loss to allow Mr. Covey to have their slaves
one year, for the sake of the training to which they
were subjected, without any other compensation. He
could hire young help with great ease, in consequence
of this reputation. Added to the natural good qual-
ities of Mr. Covey, he was a professor of religion — a
pious soul — a member and a class-leader in the Meth-
odist church. All of this added weight to his reputa-
tion as a " nigger-breaker." I was aware of all the
facts, having been made acquainted with them by a
young man who had lived there. I nevertheless made
the change gladly ; for I was sure of getting en<
to eat, which is not the smallest consideration to a
hungry man.

58 NARRATIVE OF THE

CHAPTER X.

I left Master Thomas's house, and went to live with
Mr. Covey, on the 1st of January, 1833. I was now,
for the first time in my life, a field hand. In my new
employment, I found myself even more awkward than
a country boy appeared to be in a large city. I had
been at my new home but one week before Mr. Covey
gave me a very severe whipping, cutting my back,
causing the blood to run, and raising ridges on my
flesh as large as my little finger. The details of this
affair are as follows : Mr. Covey sent me, very early
in the morning of one of our coldest days in the
month of January, to the woods, to get a load of wood.
He gave me a team of unbroken oxen. He told me
which was the in-hand ox, and which the off-hand one.
He then tied the end of a large rope around the horns
of the in-hand ox, and gave me the other end of it,
and told me, if the oxen started to run, that I must
hold on upon the rope. I had never driven oxen
before, and of course I was very awkward. I, how-
ever, succeeded in getting to the edge of the woods
with little difficulty ; but I had got a very few rods
into the woods, when the oxen took fright, and started
'full tilt, carrying .the cart against trees, and over
stumps, in the most frightful manner. I expected
every moment that my brains would be dashed out
against the trees. After running thus for a consider-
able distance, they finally upset the cart, dashing it
with great force against a tree, and threw themselves

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 59

into a dense thicket. How I escaped death, I do not
know. There I was, entirely alone, in a thick wood,
in a place new to me. My cart was upset and shat-
tered, my oxen were entangled among the young trees,
and there was none to help me. After a long spell
of effort, I succeeded in getting my cart righted, my
oxen disentangled, and again yoked to the cart. I
now proceeded with my team to the place where I had,
the day before, been chopping wood, and loaded my
cart pretty heavily, thinking in this way to tame my
oxen. I then proceeded on my way home. I had
now consumed one half of the day. I got out of the
woods safely, and now felt out of danger. I stopped
my oxen to open the woods gate ; and just as I did so,
before I could get hold of my ox-rope, the oxen again
started, rushed through the gate, catching it between
the wheel and the body of the cart, tearing it to pieces,
and coming within a few inches of crushing me against
the gate-post. Thus twice, in one short day, I es-
caped death by the merest chance. On my return,
I told Mr. Covey what had happened, and how it hap-
pened. He ordered me to return to the woods again
immediately. I did so, and he followed on after me.
Just as I got into the woods, he came up and told me
to stop my cart, and that he would teach me how to
trifle away my time, and break gates. He then went
to a large gum-tree, and with his pxe cut three large
switches, and, after trimming them up neatly with his
pocket-knife, he ordered me to take off my clothes. I
qjta.de him no answer, but stood with my clothes on.
He repeated his order. I still made him no answer,
nor did 1 move to strip myself. Upon this he rushed

60 NARRATIVE OF THE

at me with the fierceness of a tiger, tore off my
clothes, and lashed me till he had worn out his
switches, cutting me so savagely as to leave the
marks visible for a long time after. This whipping
was the first of a number just like it, and for similar
offences.

I lived with Mr. Covey one year. During the first
six months, of that year, scarce a week passed with-
out his whipping me. I was seldom free from a sore
back. My awkwardness was almost always his excuse
for whipping me. We were worked fully up to the
point of endurance. Long before day we were up, our
horses fed, and by the first approach of day we were
off to the field with our hces and ploughing teams.
Mr. Covey gave us enough to eat, but scarce time to
eat it. We were often less than five minutes taking
our meals. We were often in the field from the first
approach of day till its last lingering ray had left us ;
and at saving-fodder time, midnight often caught us in
the field binding blades.

Covey would be out with us. The way he used to
stand it, was this. He would spend the most of his
afternoons in bed. He would then come out fresh in
the evening, ready to urge us on with his words, ex-
ample, and frequently with the whip. Mr. Covey was
one of the few slaveholders who could and did work
with his hands. He was a hard-working man. He
knew by himself just what a man or a boy could do.
There was no deceiving him. His work went on in
his absence almost as well as in his presence ; and he
had the faculty of making us feel that he was ever
present with us. This he did by surprising us. He

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 61

seldom approached the spot where we were at work
openly, if he could do it secretly. lie always aimed
at taking us by surprise. Sueh was his cunning, that
we used to call him, among ourselves, " the snake."
When we were at work in the cornfield, he would
sometimes crawl on his hands and knees to avoid de-
tection, and all at once he would rise nearly in our
midst, and scream out, " Ha, ha! Come, come!
Dash on, dash on ! " This being his mode of attack,
it was never safe to stop a single minute. His com-
ings were like a thief in the night. He appeared to us
as being ever at hand. He was under every tree,
behind every stump, in every bush, and at every win-
dow, on the plantation. He would sometimes mount
his horse, as if bound to St. Michael's, a distance of
seven miles, and in half an hour afterwards you would
see him coiled up in the corner of the wood-fence, watch-
ing every motion of the slaves. He would, for this
purpose, leave his horse tied up in the woods. Again,
he would sometimes walk up to us, and give us orders
as though he was upon the point of starting on a long
journey, turn his back upon us, and make as though he
was going to the house to get ready ; and, before he
would get half way thither, he would turn short and
crawl into a fence-corner, or behind some tree, and
there watch us till the going down of the sun.

Mr. Covey's forte consisted in his power to deceive.
His life was devoted to planning and perpetrating the
grossest deceptions. Every thing he possessed in the
shape of learning or religion, he made conform to his
disposition to deceive. He seemed to think himself
equal to deceiving the Almighty. He would make a

62 NARRATIVE OF THE

short prayer in the morning, and a long prayer at
night ; and, strange as it may seem, few men would at
times appear more devotional than he. The exercises
of his family devotions were always commenced with
singing ; and, as he was a very poor singer himself,
the duty of raising the hymn generally came upon me.
He would read his hymn, and nod at me to commence.
I would at times do so ; at others, I would not. My
non-compliance would almost always produce much
confusion. To show himself independent of me, he
would start and stagger through with his hymn in the
most discordant manner. In this state of mind, he
prayed with more than ordinary spirit. Poor man !
such was his disposition, and success at deceiving, I
do verily believe that he sometimes deceived himself
into the solemn belief, that he was a sincere wor-
shipper of the most high God ; and this, too, at a time
when he may be said to have been guilty of compelling
his woman slave to commit the sin of adultery. The
facts in the case are these : Mr. Covey was a poor
man ; he was just commencing in life ; he was only
able to buy one slave ; and, shocking as is the fact, he
bought her, as he said, for a breeder. This woman
was named Caroline. Mr. Covey bought her from
Mr. Thomas Lowe, about six miles from St." MichaeUs.
She was a large, able-bodied woman, about twenty
years old. She had already given birth to one child,
which proved her to be just what he wanted. After
buying her, he hired a married man of Mr. Samuel
Harrison, to live with him one year ; and him he used
to fasten up with her every night ! The result was,
that, at the end of the year, the miserable woman gave

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 63

birth to twins. At this result Mr. Covey seemed to be
highly pleased, both with the man and the wretched
woman. Such was his joy, and that of his wife, that
nothing they could do for Caroline during her confine-
ment was too good, or too hard, to be done. The chil-
dren were regarded as being quite an addition to his
wealth.

If at any one time of my life more than another, I
was made to drink the bitterest dregs of slavery, that
time was during the first six months of my stay with
Mr. Covey. We were worked in all weathers. It was
never too hot or too cold ; it could never rain, blow,
hail, pr snow, too hard for us to work in the field.
Work, work, work, was scarcely more the order of the
day than of the night. The longest days were too
short for him, and the shortest nights too long for him.
I was somewhat unmanageable when I first went there,
but a {ew months of this discipline tamed me. Mr.
Covey succeeded in breaking me. I was broken in
body, soul, and spirit. My natural elasticity was
crushed, my intellect languished, the disposition to
read departed, the cheerful spark that lingered about
my eye died ; the dark night of slavery closed ia upon
me ; and behold a man transformed into a brute !

Sunday was my only leisure time. I spent this in a
sort of beast-like stupor, between sleep and wake,
under some large tree. At times I would rise up, a
flash of energetic freedom would dart through my soul,
accompanied with a faint beam of hope, that flickered
for a moment, and then vanished. I sank down again,
mourning over my wretched condition. I was some-
times prompted to take my life, and that of Covey, but

64 NARRATIVE OF THE

was prevented by a combination of hope and fear.
My sufferings on this plantation seem now like a dream
rather than a stern reality.

Our house stood within a few rods of the Chesa-
peake Bay, whose broad bosom was ever white with
sails from every quarter of the habitable globe. Those
beautiful vessels, robed in purest white, so delightful
to the eye of freemen, were to me so many shrouded
ghosts, to terrify and torment me with thoughts of my
wretched condition. I have often, in the deep stillness
of a summer's Sabbath, stood all alone upon the lofty
banks of that noble bay, and traced, with saddened
heart and tearful eye, the countless number of sails
moving off to the mighty ocean. The sight of these
always affected me powerfully. My thoughts would
compel utterance ; and there, with no audience but the
Almighty, I would pour out my soul's complaint, in
my rude way, with an apostrophe to the moving mul-
titude of ships : —

"You are loosed from your moorings, and are free ;
I am fast in my chains, and am a slave ! You move
merrily before the gentle gale, and I sadly before the
bloody whip ! You are freedom's swift- winged angels,
that fly round the world ; I am confined in bands of
iron ! O that I were free ! O, that I were on one of
your gallant decks, and under your protecting wing !
Alas ! betwixt me and you, the turbid waters roll. Go
on, go on. O that I could also go ! Could I but swim !
If I could fly ! O, why was I born a man, of whom to
make a brute ! The glad ship is gone ; she hides in
the dim distance. I am left in the hottest hell of un-
ending slavery. O God, save me ! God, deliver me !

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 65

Let me be free ! Is there any God ? Why am I a
slave ? I will run away. I will not stand it. Get
caught, or get clear, I'll try it. I had as well die with
ague as the fever. I have only one life to lose. I had
well be killed running as die standing. Only think
of it ; one hundred miles straight north, and I am free !
Try it? Yes! God helping me, I will. It cannot be
that I shall live and die a slave. I will take to the water.
This very bay shall yet bear me into freedom. The
steamboats steered in a north-east course from North
Point. I will do the same ; and when I get to the head
of the bay, I will turn my canoe adrift, and walk
straight through Delaware into Pennsylvania. When 1
get there, I shall not be required to have a pass ; I can
travel without being disturbed. Let but the first op-
portunity offer, and, come what will, I am off. Mean-
while, I will try to bear up under the yoke. I am not
the only slave in the world. Why should I fret ? 1
can bear as much as any of them. Besides, I am but
a boy, and all boys are bound to some one. It may
be that my misery in slavery will only increase my
happiness when I get free. There is a better day
coming."

Thus I used to think, and thus I used to speak to
myself; goaded almost to madness at one moment,
and at the next reconciling myself to my wretched lot.

I have already intimated that my condition was
much worse, during the first six months of my stay at
Mr. Covey's, than in the last six. The circumstances
« leading to the change in Mr. Covey's course toward me
form an epoch in my humble history. You have seen
how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a
5

66 NARRATIVE OF THE

slave was made a man. On one of the hottest days
•of the month of August, 1833, Bill Smith, William
Hughes, a slave named Eli, and myself, were engaged
in fanning wheat. Hughes was clearing the fanned
wheat from before the fan, Eli was turning, Smith was
feeding, and I was carrying wheat to the fan. The
work was simple, requiring strength rather than intel-
lect ; yet, to one entirely unused to such work, it came
very hard. About three o'clock of that day, I broke
down; my strength failed me; I was seized with a
violent aching of the head, attended with extreme diz-
ziness ; I trembled in every limb. Finding what was
coming, I nerved myself up, feeling it would never do
to stop work. I stood as long as I could stagger to the
hopper with grain. When I could stand no longer, I
fell, and felt as if held down by an immense weight.
The fan of course stopped ; every one had his own
work to do ; and no one could do the work of the other,
and have his own go on at the same time.

Mr. Covey was at the house, about one hundred
yards from the treading-yard where we were fanning.
On hearing the fan stop, he left immediately, and came
to the spot where we were. He hastily inquired what
the matter was. Bill answered that I was sick, and
there was no one to bring wheat to the fan. I had by
this time crawled away under the side of the post and
rail-fence by which the yard was enclosed, hoping to
find relief by getting out of the sun. He then asked
where I was. He was told by one of the hands. He
came to the spot, and, after looking at me awhile,
asked me what was the matter. I told him as well as
I could, for I scarce had strength to speak. He then

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 67

gave me a savage kick in the side, and told me to get
up. I tried to do so, but fell back in the attempt. He
gave me another kick, and again told me to rise. I
again tried, and succeeded in gaining my feet; but,
stooping to get the tub with which I was feeding the
fan, I again staggered and fell. While down in this
situation, Mr. Covey took up the hickory slat with
which Hughes had been striking off the half-bushel
measure, and with it gave me a heavy blow upon the
head, making a large wound, and the blood ran freely ;
and with this again told me to get up. I made no
effort to comply, having now made up my mind to let
him do his worst. In a short time after receiving this
blow, my head grew better. Mr. Covey had now left
me to my fate. At this moment I resolved, for the
first time, to go to my master, enter a complaint,
and ask his protection. In order to this, I must that
afternoon walk seven miles ; and this, under the cir-
cumstances, was truly a severe undertaking. I was
exceedingly feeble ; made so as much by the kicks and
blows which I received, as by the severe fit of sickness
to which I had been subjected. I, however, watched my
chance, while Covey was looking in an opposite direc-
tion, and started for St. Michael's. I succeeded in
getting a considerable distance on my way to the
woods, when Covey discovered me, and called after
me to come back, threatening what he would do if I
did not come. I disregarded both his calls and his
threats, and made my way to the woods as fast as my
feeble state would allow ; and thinking I might be
overhauled by him if I kept the road, I walked through
the woods, keeping far enough from the road to avoid

68 NARRATIVE OF THE

detection, and near enough to prevent losing my way,
I had not gone far before my little strength again
failed me. I could go no farther. I fell down, and lay
for a considerable time. The blood was yet oozing
from the wound on my head. For a time I thought I
should bleed to death ; and think now that I should have
done so, but that the blood so matted my hair as to stop
the wound. After lying there about three quarters of
an hour, I nerved myself up again, and started on my
way, through bogs and briers, barefooted and bare-
headed, tearing my feet sometimes at nearly every
step ; and after a journey of about seven miles, occupy-
ing some five hours to perform it, I arrived at master's
store. I then presented an appearance enough to
affect any but a heart of iron. From the crown of my
head to my feet, I was covered with blood. My hair
was all clotted with dust and blood ; my shirt was stiff
with blood. My legs and feet were torn in sundry
places with briers and thorns, and were also covered
with blood. I suppose I looked like a man who had
escaped a den of wild beasts, and barely escaped them.
In this state I appeared before my master, humbly
entreating him to interpose his authority for my protec-
tion. I told him all the circumstances as well as I
could, and it seemed, as I spoke, at times to affect him.
He would then walk the floor, and seek to justify
Covey by saying he expected I deserved it. He asked
me what I wanted. I told him, to let me get a new
home ; that as sure as I lived with Mr. Covey again, I
should live with but to die with him ; that Covey would
surely kill me ; he was in a fair way for it. Master
Thomas ridiculed the idea that there was any danger

1

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 69

of Mr. Covey's killing me, and said that he knew Mr.
Covey ; that he was a good man, and that he could
not think of taking me from him ; that, should he do
so, he would lose the whole year's wages ; that I be-
longed to Mr. Covey for one year, and that I must go
back to him, come what might ; and that I must not
trouble him with any more stories, or that he would
himself get hold of me. After threatening me thus,
he gave me a very large dose of salts, telling me that
I might remain in St. Michael's that night, (it being
quite late,) but that I must be off back to Mr. Covey's
early in the morning ; and that if I did not, he would
get hold of me, which meant that he would whip me.
I remained all night, and, according to his orders, I
started off to Covey's in the morning, (Saturday morn-
ing,) wearied in body and broken in spirit. I got no
supper that night, or breakfast that morning. I reached
Covey's about nine o'clock ; and just as I was getting
over the fence that divided Mrs. Kemp's fields from
ours, out ran Covey with his cowskin, to give me another
whipping. Before he could reach me, I succeeded in
getting to the cornfield ; and as the corn was very
high, it afforded me the means of hiding. He seemed
very angry, and searched for me a long time. My
behavior was altogether unaccountable. He finally
gave up the chase, thinking, I suppose, that I must
come home for something to eat ; he would give
himself no further trouble in looking for me. I spent
that day mostly in the woods, having the alternative
before me, — to go home and be, whipped to death, or
stay in the woods and be starved to death. That
night, I fell in with Sandy Jenkins, a slave with whom

70 NARRATIVE OF THE

I was somewhat acquainted. Sandy had a free wife
who lived about four miles from Mr. Covey's ; and it
being Saturday, he was on his way to see her. I told
him my circumstances, and he very kindly invited
me to go home with him. I went home with him,
and talked this whole matter over, and got his ad-
vice as to what course it was best for me to pursue.
I found Sandy an old adviser. He told me, with great
solemnity, I must go back to Covey ; but that before I
went, I must go with him into another part of the
woods, where there was a certain root, which, if I
would take some of it with me, carrying it always on
my right side, would render it impossible for Mr. Covey,
or any other white man, to whip me. He said he had
carried it for years ; and since he had done so, he had
never received a blow, and never expected to while he
carried it. I at first rejected the idea, that the simple
carrying of a root in my pocket would have any such
effect as he had said, and was not disposed to take it ;
but Sandy impressed the necessity with much earnest-
ness, telling me it could do no harm, if it did no good.
To please him, I at length took the root, and, according
to his direction, carried it upon my right side. This
was Sunday morning. I immediately started for home ;
and upon entering the yard gate, out came Mr. Covey
on his way to meeting. He spoke to me very kindly,
bade me drive the pigs from a lot near by, and passed
on towards the church. Now, this singular conduct of
Mr. Covey really made me begin to think that there was
something in the root which Sandy had given me ;
and had it been on any other day than Sunday, I could
have attributed the conduct to no other cause than the

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 71

influence of that root ; and as it was, I was half in-
clined to think the root to he something more than I
at first had taken it to be. All went well till Mon-
day morning. On this morning, the virtue of the root
was fully tested. Long before daylight, 1 was called
to go and rub, curry, and feed, the horses. I obeyed,
and was glad to obey. But whilst thus engaged, whilst
in the act of throwing down some blades from the loft,
Mr. Covey entered the stable with a long rope ; and
just as I was half out of the loft, he caught hold of my
legs, and was about tying me. As soon as I found
what he was up to, I gave a sudden spring, and as I
did so, he holding to my legs, I was brought sprawling
on the stable floor. Mr. Covey seemed now to think
he had me, and could do what he pleased ; but at this
moment — from whence came the spirit I don't know —
I resolved to fight ; and, suiting my action to the reso-
lution, I seized Covey hard by the throat ; and as I did
so, I rose. He held on to me, and I to him. My re-
sistance was so entirely unexpected, that Covey seemed
taken ail aback. He trembled like a leaf. This gave
me assurance, and I held him uneasy, causing the
blood to run where I touched him with the ends of my
fingers. Mr. Covey soon called out to Hughes for
help. Hughes came, and, while Covey held me, at-
tempted to tie my right hand. While he was in the
act of doing so, I watched my chance, and gave him
a heavy kick close under the ribs. This kick fairly
sickened Hughes, so that he left me in the hands of
Mr. Covey. This kick had the effect of not only
weakening Hughes, but Covey also. When he saw
Hughes bending over with pain, his courage quailed.

72 NARRATIVE OF THE

He asked me if I meant to persist in my resistance. I
told him I did, come what might ; that he had used me
like a brute for six months, and that I was determined
to be used so no longer. With that, he strove to
drag me to a stick that was lying just out of the
stable door. He meant to knock me down. But just
as he was leaning over to get the stick, I seized him
with both hands by his collar, and brought him by a
sudden snatch to the ground. By this time, Bill came.
Covey called upon him for assistance. Bill wanted to
know what he could do. Covey said, " Take hold of
him, take hold of him ! " Bill said his master hired
him out to work, and not to help to whip me ; so he
left Covey and myself to fight our own battle out.
We were at it for nearly two hours. Covey at length
let me go, purring and blowing at a great rate, saying
that if I had not resisted, he would not have whipped
me half so much. The truth was, that he had not
whipped me at all. I considered him as getting en-
tirely the worst end of the bargain ; for he had drawn
no blood from me, but I had from him. The whole
six months afterwards, that I spent with Mr. Covey, he
never laid the weight of his finger upon me in anger.
He would occasionally say, he didn't want to get hold
of me again. u No," thought I, " you need not ; for
you will come off worse than you did before."

This battle with Mr. Covey was the turning-point in
my career as a slave. It rekindled the few expiring
embers of freedom, and revived within me a sense of
my own manhood. It recalled the departed self-con-
fidence, and inspired me again with a determination to
be free. The gratification afforded by the triumph

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 73

was a full compensation for whatever else might fol-
low, even death itself. He only can understand the
deep satisfaction which I experienced, who has himself
repelled by force the bloody arm of slavery. I felt as
I never felt before. It was a glorious resurrection,
from the tomb of slavery, to the heaven of freedom.
My long-crushed spirit rose, cowardice departed, bold
defiance took its place ; and I now resolved that, how-
ever long I might remain a slave in form, the day had
passed forever when I could be a slave in fact. I did
not hesitate to let it be known of me, that the white
man who expected to succeed in whipping, must also
succeed in killing me.

From this time I was never again what might be
called fairly whipped, though I remained a slave four
years afterwards. I had several fights, but was never
whipped.

It was for a long time a matter of surprise to me
why Mr. Covey did not immediately have me taken by
the constable to the whipping-post, and there regularly
whipped for the crime of raising my hand against a
white man in defence of myself. And the only ex-
planation I can now think of does not entirely satisfy
me ; but such as it is, I will give it. Mr. Covey en-
joyed the most unbounded reputation for being a first-
rate overseer and negro-breaker. - It was of consider-
able importance to him. That reputation was at stake ;
and had he sent me — a boy about sixteen years old —
to the public whipping-post, his reputation would have
been lost ; so, to save his reputation, he suffered me to
go unpunished.

My term of actual service to Mr. Edward Covey

74 NARRATIVE OF THE

ended on Christmas day, 1833. The days between
Christmas and New Year's day are allowed as holi-
days ; and, accordingly, we were not required to per-
form any labor, more than to feed and take care of the
stock. This time we regarded as our own, by the
grace of our masters ; and we therefore used or abused
it nearly as we pleased. Those of us who had fami-
lies at a distance, were generally allowed to spend the
whole six days in their society. This time, however,
was spent in various ways. The staid, sober, thinking
and industrious ones of our number would employ
themselves in making corn-brooms, mats, horse-collars,
and baskets ; and another class of us would spend the
time in hunting, opossums, hares, and coons. But by
far the larger part engaged in such sports and merri-
ments as playing ball, wrestling, running foot-races,
fiddling, dancing, and drinking whisky ; and this lat-
ter mode of spending the time was by far the most
agreeable to the feelings of our masters. A slave who
would work during the holidays was considered by our
masters as scarcely deserving them. He was regarded
as one who rejected the favor of his master. It was
deemed a disgrace not to get drunk at Christmas ; and
he was regarded as lazy indeed, who had not provided
himself with the necessary means, during the year, to
get whisky enough to last him through Christmas.

From what I know of the effect of these holidays
upon the slave, I believe them to be among the most
effective means in the hands of the slaveholder in
keeping down the spirit of insurrection. Were the
slaveholders at once to abandon this practice, I have
not the slightest doubt it would lead to an immediate

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 75

insurrection among the slaves. These holidays serve as
conductors, or safety-valves, to carry off the rebellious
spirit of enslaved humanity. But for these, the slave
would he forced up to the wildest desperation ; and
woe betide the slaveholder, the day he ventures to
remove or hinder the operation of those conductors !
I warn him that, in such an event, a spirit will go forth
in their midst, more to be dreaded than the most
appalling earthquake.

The holidays are part and parcel of the gross fraud,
wrong, and inhumanity of slavery. They are pro-
fessedly a custom established by the benevolence of the
slaveholders ; but I undertake to say, it is the result of
selfishness, and one of the grossest frauds committed
upon the down-trodden slave. They do not give the
slaves this time because they would not like to have
their work during its continuance, but because they
know it would be unsafe to deprive them of it. This
will be seen by the fact, that the slaveholders like to
have their slaves spend those days just in such a man-
ner as to make them as glad of their ending as of their
beginning. Their object seems to be, to disgust their
slaves with freedom, by plunging them into the lowest
depths of dissipation. For instance, the slaveholders
not only like to see the slave drink of his own accord,
but will adopt various plans to make him drunk. One
plan is, to make bets on their slaves, as to who can
drink the most whisky without getting drunk ; and in
this way they succeed in getting whole multitudes to
drink to excess. Thus, when the slave asks for
virtuous freedom, the cunning slaveholder, knowing
his ignorance, cheats him with a dose of vicious dissi-

76 NARRATIVE OF THE

pation, artfully labelled with the name -of liberty. The
most of us used to drink it down, and the result was
just what might be supposed : many of us were led to
think that there was little to choose between 'liberty
and slavery. We felt, and very properly too, that we
had almost as well be slaves to man as to rum. So,
when the holidays ended, we staggered up from the
filth of our wallowing, took a long breath, and marched
to the field, — feeling, upon the whole, rather glad to
go, from what our master had deceived us into a belief
was freedom, back to the arms of slavery.

I have said that this mode of treatment is a part of
the whole system of fraud and inhumanity of slavery.
It is so. The mode here adopted to disgust the slave
with freedom, by allowing him to see only the abuse
of it, is carried out in other things. For instance, a
slave loves molasses ; he steals some. His master, in
many cases, goes off to town, and buys a large quan-
tity ; he returns, takes his whip, and commands the
slave to eat the molasses, until the poor fellow is made
sick at the very mention of it. The same mode is
sometimes adopted to make the slaves refrain from ask-
ing for more food than their regular allowance. A
slave runs through his allowance, and applies for more.
His master is enraged at him ; but, not willing to send
him off without food, gives him more than is necessary,
and compels him to eat it within a given time. Then,
if he complains that he cannot eat it, he is said to be
satisfied neither full nor fasting, and is whipped for
being hard to please ! I have an abundance of such
illustrations of the same principle, drawn from my own

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 77

observation, but think the cases I have cited sufficient.
The practice is a very common one.

On the first of January, 1834, I left Mr. Covey, and
went to live with Mr. William Freeland, who lived
about three miles from St. Michael's. I soon found
Mr. Freeland a very different man from Mr. Covey.
Though not rich, he was what would be called an
educated southern gentleman. Mr. Covey, as I have
shown, was a well-trained negro-breaker and slave-
driver. The former (slaveholder though he was)
seemed to possess some regard for honor, some rever-
ence for justice, and some respect for humanity/ The
latter seemed totally insensible to all such sentiments.
Mr. Freeland had many of the faults peculiar to slave-
holders, such as being very passionate and fretful ; but
I must do him the justice to say, that he was exceed-
ingly free from those degrading vices to which Mr.
Covey was constantly addicted. The one was open
and frank, and we always knew where to find him.
The other was a most artful deceiver, and could be
understood only by such as were skilful enough to
detect his cunningly-devised frauds. Another advan-
tage I gained in my new master was, he made no pre-
tensions to, or profession of, religion ; and this, in my
opinion, was truly a great advantage. I assert most
unhesitatingly, that the religion of the south is a mere
covering for the most horrid crimes, — a justifier of the
most appalling barbarity, — a sanctifier of the most
hateful frauds, — and a dark shelter under, which the
darkest, foulest, grossest, and most infernal deeds of
slaveholders find the strongest protection. Were I to
be again reduced to the chains of slavery, next to that

78 NARRATIVE OF THE

enslavement, I should regard being the slave of a
religious master the greatest calamity that could be-
fall me. For of all slaveholders with whom I have
ever met, religious slaveholders are the worst. I have
ever found them the meanest and basest, the most cruel
and cowardly, of all others. It was my unhappy lot not
only to belong to a religious slaveholder, but to live in
a community of such religionists. Very near Mr.
Freeland lived the Rev. Daniel Weeden, and in the
same neighborhood lived the Rev. Rigby Hopkins.
These were members and ministers' in the Reformed
Methodist Church. Mr. Weeden owned, among others,
a woman slave, whose name I have forgotten. This
woman's back, for weeks, was kept literally raw, made
so by the lash of this merciless, religious wretch. He
used to hire hands. His maxim was, Behave well or
behave ill, it is the duty of a master occasionally to
whip a slave, to remind him of his master's authority.
Such was his theory, and such his practice.

Mr. Hopkins was even worse than Mr. Weeden.
His chief boast was his ability to manage slaves. The
peculiar feature of his government was that of whip-
ping slaves in advance of deserving it. He always
managed to have one or more of his slaves to whip
every Monday morning. He did this to alarm their
fears, and strike terror into those who escaped. His
plan was to whip for the smallest offences, to prevent
the commission of large ones. Mr. Hopkins could
always find some excuse for whipping a slave. It
would astonish one, unaccustomed to a slaveholding
life, to see with what wonderful ease a slaveholder can
find things, of which to make occasion to whip a slave.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 79

A mere look, word, or motion, — a mistake, accident, or
want of power, — arc all matters for which a slave may
be whipped at any time. Does a slave look dissatis-
fied ? It is said, he has the devil in him, and it must
be whipped out. Does he speak loudly when spoken
to by his master ? Then he is getting high-minded,
and should be taken down a button-hole lower. Does
he forget to pull off his hat at the approach of a white
person ? Then he is wanting in reverence, and should
be whipped for it. Does he ever venture to vindicate
his conduct, when censured for it ? Then he is guilty
of impudence, — one of the greatest crimes of which a
slave can be guilty. Does he ever venture to suggest
a different mode of doing things, from that pointed out
by his master ? He is indeed presumptuous, and
getting above himself; and nothing less than a flogging
will do for him. Does he, while ploughing, break a
plough, — or, while hoeing, break a hoe ? It is owing
to his carelessness, and for it a slave must always be
whipped. ' Mr. Hopkins could always find something
of this sort to justify the use of the lash, and he seldom
failed to embrace such opportunities. There was not a
man in the whole county, with whom the slaves who
had the getting their own home, would not prefer to live,
rather than with this Rev. Mr. Hopkins. And yet there
was not a man any where round, who made higher
professions of religion, or was more active in revivals,
— more attentive to the class, love-feast, prayer and
preaching meetings, or more devotional in his family, —
that prayed earlier, later, louder, and longer, — than
this same reverend slave-driver, Rigby Hopkins.

But to return to Mr. Freeland, arid to my experience

80 NARRATIVE OF THE

while in his employment. He, like Mr. Covey, gave
us enough to eat ; but, unlike Mr. Covey, he also gave
us sufficient time to take our meals.* He worked us
hard, but always between sunrise and sunset. He
required a good deal of work to be done, but gave
us good tools with which to work. His farm was
large, but he employed hands enough to work it,
and with ease, compared with many of his neighbors.
My treatment, while in his employment, was heavenly,
compared with what I experienced at the hands of Mr.
Edward Covey.

Mr. Freeland was himself the owner of but two
slaves. Their names were Henry Harris and John
Harris. The rest of his hands he hired. These con-
sisted of myself, Sandy Jenkins,* and Handy Caldwell.
Henry and John were quite intelligent, and in a very
little while after I went there, I succeeded in creating
in them a strong desire to learn how to read. This
desire soon sprang up in the others also. They very
soon mustered up some old spelling-books, arid nothing
would do but that I must keep a Sabbath school. I
agreed to do so, and accordingly devoted my Sundays
to teaching these my loved fellow-slaves how to read.
Neither of them knew his letters when I went there.
Some of the slaves of the neighboring farms found

* This is the same man who gave me the roots to prevent
my being whipped by Mr. Covey. He was " a clever soul."
We used frequently to talk about the fight with Covey, and as
often as we did so, he would claim my success as the result of
the roots which he gave me. This superstition is very com-
mon among the more ignorant slaves. A slave seldom dies
but that his death is attributed to trickery.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 81

what was going on, and also availed themselves of this
little opportunity to learn to read. It was understood,
among all who came, that there must be as little dis-
play about it as possible. It was necessary to keep
our religious masters at St. Michael's unacquainted
with the fact, that, instead of spending the Sabbath in
wrestling, boxing, and drinking whisky, we were try-
ing to learn how to read the will of God ; for they
had much rather see us engaged in those degrading
sports, than to see us behaving like intellectual, moral,,
and accountable beings. My blood boils as I think of
the bloody manner in which Messrs. Wright Fairbanks
and Garrison West, both class-leaders, in connection
with many others, rushed in upon us with sticks and
stones, and broke up our virtuous little Sabbath school,
at St. Michael's — all calling themselves Christians!
humble followers of the Lord Jesus Christ ! But I am
again digressing.

I held my Sabbath school at the house of a free
colored man, whose name I deem it imprudent to men-
tion ; for should it be known, it might embarrass him
greatly, though the crime of holding the school was
committed ten years ago. I had at one time over forty
scholars, and those of the right sort, ardently desiring
to learn. They were of all ages, though mostly men
and women. I look back to those Sundays with an
amount of pleasure not to be expressed. They were
great days to my soul. The work of instructing my
dear fellow-slaves was the sweetest engagement with
which I was ever blessed. We loved each other, and
ave them at the close of the Sabbath was a severe
en ss indeed. When I think that these precious souls
6

82 NARRATIVE OF THE

are to-day shut up in the prison-house of slavery, my
feelings overcome me, and I am almost ready to ask,
" Does a righteous God govern the universe ? and for
what does he hold the thunders in his right hand, if not
to smite the oppressor, and deliver the spoiled out of
the hand of the spoiler ? " These dear souls came
not to Sabbath school because it was popular to do so,
nor did I teach them because it was reputable to be
thus engaged. Every moment they spent in that
school, they were liable to be taken up, and given
thirty-nine lashes. They came because they wished
to learn. Their minds had been starved by their cruel
masters. They had been shut up in mental darkness.
I taught them, because it was the delight of my soul to
be doing something that looked like bettering the con-
dition of my race. I kept up my school nearly the
whole year I lived with Mr. Freeland ; and, beside
my Sabbath school, I devoted three evenings in the
week, during the winter, to teaching the . slaves at
home. And I have the happiness to know, that several
of those who came to Sabbath school learned how to
read ; and that one, at least, is now free through my
agency.

The year passed off smoothly-. It seemed only
about half as long as the year which preceded it. I
went through it without receiving a single blow. I will
give Mr. Freeland the credit of being the best master I
ever had, till I became my oivn master. For the ease
with which I passed the year, I was, however, some-
what indebted to the society of my fellow-slaves.
They were noble souls ; they not only possessed loving
hearts, but brave ones. We were linked and inter-

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS.

linked with each other. I loved them with a love
stronger than any thing I have experienced since. It
is sometimes said that we slaves do not love and con-
fide in each other. In answer to this assertion, I can
say, I never loved any or confided in any people more
than my fellow-slaves, and especially those with whom
I lived at Mr. Freeland's. I believe we would have
died for each other. We never undertook to do any
thing, of any importance, without a mutual consultation.
We never moved separately. We were one ; and as
much so by our tempers and dispositions, as by the
mutual hardships to which we were necessarily sub-
jected by our condition as slaves.

At the close of the year 1834, Mr. Freeland again
hired me of my master, for the year 1835. But, by
this time, I began to want to live upon free land as well
as with Freeland ; and I was no longer content, there-
fore, to live with him or any other slaveholder. I
began, with the commencement of the year, to prepare
myself for a final struggle, which should decide my
fate one way or the other. My tendency was upward.
I was fast approaching manhood, and year after year
had passed, and I was still a slave. These thoughts
roused me — I must do something. I therefore re-
solved that 1835 should not pass without witnessing
an attempt, on my part, to secure my liberty. But I
was not willing to cherish this determination alone. My
fellow-slaves were dear to me. I was anxious to have
them participate with me in this, my life-giving deter-
mination. I therefore, though with great prudence,
commenced early to ascertain their views and feelings
in regard to their condition, and to imbue their minds

84 NARRATIVE OF THE

with thoughts of freedom. I bent myself to devising
ways and means for our escape, and meanwhile strove,
on all fitting occasions, to impress them with the gross
fraud and inhumanity of slavery. I went first to
Henry, next to John, then to the others. I found, in
them all, warm hearts and noble spirits. They were
ready to hear, and ready to act when a feasible plan
should be proposed. This was what I wanted. I talked
to them of our want of manhood, if we submitted to
our enslavement without at least one noble effort to be
free. We met often, and consulted frequently, and
told our hopes and fears, recounted the difficulties, real
and imagined, which we should be called on to meet.
At times we were almost disposed to give up, and try
to content ourselves with our wretched lot ; at others,
we were firm and unbending in our determination to go.
Whenever we suggested any plan, there was shrink-
ing— the odds were fearful. Our path was beset with
the greatest obstacles ; and if we succeeded in gaining
the end of it, our right to be free was yet questionable

— we were yet liable to be returned to bondage. We
could see no spot, this side of the ocean, where we
could be free. We knew nothing about Canada. Our
knowledge of the north did not extend farther than
New York ; and to go there, and be forever harassed
.with the frightful liability of being returned to slavery

— with the certainty of being treated tenfold worse than
before — the thought, was truly a horrible one, and
one which it was not easy to overcome. The case
sometimes stood thus : At every gate through which
we were to pass, we saw a watchman — at every
ferry a guard — -on every bridge a sentinel — and in

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 85

every wood a patrol. We were hemmed in upon
every side. Here were the difficulties, real or im-
agined— the good to be sought, and the evil to be
shunned. On the one hand, there stood slavery, a
stern reality, glaring frightfully upon us, — its robes
already crimsoned with the blood of millions, and even
now feasting itself greedily upon our own flesh. On the
other hand, away back in the dim distance, under the
flickering light of the north star, behind some craggy
hill or snow-covered mountain, stood a doubtful free-
dom — half frozen — beckoning us to come and share
its hospitality. This in itself was sometimes enough
to stagger us ; but when we permitted ourselves to
survey the road, we were frequently appalled. Upon
either side we saw grim death, assuming the most
horrid shapes. Now it was starvation, causing us to
eat our own flesh ; — now we were contending with
the waves, and were drowned ; — now we were over-
taken, and torn to pieces by the fangs of the terrible
bloodhound. We were stung by scorpions, chased by
wild beasts, bitten by snakes, and finally, after having
nearly reached the desired spot, — after swimming
rivers, encountering wild beasts, sleeping in the woods,
suffering hunger and nakedness, — we were overtaken
by our pursuers, and, in our resistance, we were shot
dead upon the spot ! I say, this picture sometimes
appalled us, and made us

11 rather bear those ills we had,
Than fly to others, that we knew not of."

In coming to a fixed determination to run away, we
did more than Patrick Henry, when he resolved upon

86 NARRATIVE OF THE

liberty or death. With us it was a doubtful liberty at
most, and almost certain death if we failed. For my
part, I should prefer death to hopeless bondage.

Sandy, one of our number, gave up the notion, but
still encouraged us. Our company then consisted of
Henry Harris, John Harris, Henry Bailey, Charles
Roberts, and myself. Hemy Bailey was my uncle,
and belonged to my master. Charles married my
aunt : he belonged to my master's father-in-law, Mr.
William Hamilton.

The plan we finally concluded upon was, to get a
large canoe belonging to Mr. Hamilton, and upon the
Saturday night previous to Easter holidays, paddle di-
rectly up the Chesapeake Bay. • On our arrival at the
head of the bay, a distance of seventy or eighty miles
from where we lived, it was our purpose to turn our
canoe adrift, and follow the guidance of the north star
till we got beyond the limits of Maryland. Our reason
for taking the water route was, that we were less liable
to be suspected as runaways ; we hoped to be re-
garded as fishermen ; whereas, if we should take the
land route, we should be subjected to interruptions of
almost every kind. Any one having a white face, and
being so disposed, could stop us, and subject us to
examination.

The week before our intended start, I wrote sev-
eral protections, one for each of us. As well as I can
remember, they were in the following words, to wit : —

" This is to certify that I, the undersigned, have given
the bearer, my servant, full liberty to go to Baltimore,

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 81

and spend the Easter holidays. Written with mine
own hand, &c, 1835.

"William Hamilton,
"Near St. Michael's, in Talbot county, Maryland."

We were not going to Baltimore ; but, in going up the
bay, we went toward Baltimore, and those protections
were only intended to protect us while on the bay.

As the time drew near for our departure, our anxiety
became more and more intense. It was truly a matter
of life and death with us. The strength of our deter-
mination was about to be fully tested. At this time, I
was very active in explaining every difficulty, remov-
ing every doubt, dispelling every fear, and inspiring all
with the firmness indispensable to success in our un-
dertaking ; assuring them that half was gained the
instant we made the move ; we had talked long
enough ; we were now ready to move ; if not now, we
never should be ; and if we did not intend to move
now, we had as well fold our arms, sit down, and ac-
knowledge ourselves fit only to be slaves. This, none
of us were prepared to acknowledge. Every man
stood firm ; and at our last meeting, we pledged our-
selves afresh, in the most solemn manner, that, at the
time appointed, we would certainly start in pursuit of
freedom. This was in the middle of the week, at the
end of which we were to be oil. We went, as usual,
to our several fields of labor, but with bosoms highly
agitated with thoughts of our truly hazardous under-
taking. We tried to conceal our feelings as much as
possible ; and I think we succeeded very well.

After a painful waiting, the Saturday morning,

88

NARRATIVE OF THE

whose night was to witness our departure, came. I
hailed it with joy, bring what of sadness it might.
Friday night was a sleepless one for me. I probably
felt more anxious than the rest, because I was, by com-
mon consent, at the head of the whole affair. The
responsibility of success or failure lay heavily upon
me. The glory of the one, and the confusion of the
other, were alike mine. The first two hours of that
morning were such as I never experienced before, and
hope never to again. Early in the morning, we went,
as usual, to the field. We were spreading manure ;
and all at once, while thus engaged, I was over-
whelmed with an indescribable feeling, in the fulness
of which I turned to Sandy, who was near by, and
said, " We are betrayed ! " " Well," said he, " that
thought has this moment struck- me." We said no
more. I was never more certain of any thing.

The horn was blown as usual, and we went up from
the field to the house for breakfast. I went for the
form, more than for want of any thing to eat that
morning. Just as I got to the house, in looking out at
the lane gate, I saw four white men, with two colored
men. The white men were on horseback, and the
colored ones were walking behind, as if tied. I
watched them a few moments till they got up to our
lane gate. Here they halted, and tied the colored men
to the gate-post. I was not yet certain as to what the
matter was. In a few moments, in rode Mr. Hamilton,
with a speed betokening great excitement. He came
io the door, and inquired if Master William was in.
He was told he was at the barn. Mr. Hamilton, with-
out dismounting, rode up to the barn with extraor-

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 89

dinary speed. In a few moments, he and Mr. Free-
land returned to the house. By this time, the three
constables rode up, and in great haste dismounted, tied
their horses, and met Master William and Mr. Hamil-
ton returning from the barn ; and after talking awhile,
they all walked up to the kitchen door. There was no
one in the kitchen but myself and John. Henry and
Sandy were up # the barn. Mr. Freeland put his
head in at the door, and called me by name, saying,
there were some gentlemen at the door who wished to
see me. I stepped to the door, and inquired what they
wanted. They at once seized me, and, without giving
me any satisfaction, tied me — lashing my hands
closely together. T insisted upon knowing what the
matter was. They at length said, that they had
learned I had been in a " scrape," and that I was to
be examined before my master ; and if their informa-
tion proved false, I should not be hurt.

In a few moments, they succeeded in tying John.
They then turned to Henry, who had by this time
returned, and commanded him to cross his hands. " I
won't ! " said Henry, in a firm tone, indicating his readi-
ness to meet the consequences of his refusal. " Won't
you ? " said Tom Graham, the constable. " No, I
won't ! " said Henry, in a still stronger tone. With this,
two of the constables pulled out their shining pistols,
and swore, by their Creator, that they would make him
cross his hands or kill him. Each cocked his pistol,
and, with fingers on the trigger, walked up to Henry,
saying, at the same time, if he did not cross his hands,
they would blow his damned heart out. " Shoot me,
shoot me !" said Henry ; " you can't kill me but once.

90 NARRATIVE OF THE

Shoot, shoot, — and be damned ! / won't be tied ! "
This he said in a tone of loud defiance ; and at the same
time, with a motion as quick as lightning, he with one
single stroke dashed the pistols from the hand of each
constable. As he did this, all hands fell upon him,
and, after beating him some time, they finally over-
powered him, and got him tied.

During the scuffle, I managed, I k0Dw not how, to get
my pass out, and, without being discovered, put it into
the fire. We were all now tied ; and just as we were
to leave for Easton jail, Betsy Freeland, mother of
William Freeland, came to the door with her hands
full of biscuits, and divided them between Henry and
John. She then delivered herself of a speech, to the
following effect: — addressing herself to me, she said,
" You devil ! You yellow devil ! it was you that put it
into the heads of Henry and John to run away. But
for you, you long-legged mulatto devil ! Henry nor
John would never have thought of such a thing." I
made no reply, and was immediately hurried off to-
wards St. Michael's. Just a moment previous to the
scuffle with Henry, Mr. Hamilton suggested the pro-
priety of making a search for the protections which he
had understood Frederick had written for himself and
the rest. But, just at the moment he was about carry-
ing his proposal into effect, his aid was needed in help-
ing to tie Henry ; and the excitement attending the
scuffle caused them either to forget, or to deem it
unsafe, under the circumstances, to search. So we
were not yet convicted of the intention to run away.

When we got about half way to St. Michael's, while
the constables having us in charge were looking ahead,

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 91

Henry inquired of me what he should do with his pass.
I told him to eat it with his biscuit, and own nothing ;
and we passed the word around, "Own nothing;''''
and " Own nothing!'1'' said we all. Our confidence in
each other was unshaken. We were resolved to suc-
ceed or fail together, after the calamity had befallen
us as much as before. We were now prepared for
any thing. We*were to be dragged that morning
fifteen miles behind horses, and then to be placed in
the Easton jail. When we reached St. Michael's, we
underwent a sort of examination. We all denied that we
ever intended to run away. We did this more to bring
out the evidence against us, than from any hope of get-
ting clear of being sold ; for, as I have said, we were
ready for that. The fact was, we cared but little where
we went, so we went together. Our greatest concern
was about separation. We dreaded that more than
any thing this side of death. We found the evidence
against us to be the testimony of one person ; our
master would not tell who it was ; but we came to a
unanimous decision among ourselves as to who their
informant was. We were sent off to the jail at Easton.
When we got there, we were delivered up to the sheriff,
Mr. Joseph Graham, and by him placed in jail. Henry,
John, and myself, were placed in one room together —
Charles, and Henry Bailey, in another. Their object in
separating us was to hinder concert.

We had been in jail scarcely twenty minutes, when
a swarm of slave traders, and agents for slave traders,
flocked into jail to look at us, and to ascertain if
we were for sale. Such a set of beings 1 never saw
before ! I felt myself surrounded by so many fiends

92 NARRATIVE OF THE

from perdition. A band of pirates never looked more
like their father, the devil. They laughed and grinned
over us, saying, " Ah, my boys ! we have got you,
haven't we ? " And after taunting us in various ways,
they one by one went into an examination of us, with
intent to ascertain our value. They would impudently
ask us if we would not like to have them for our
masters. We would make them no answer, and leave
them to find out as best they could. Then they would
curse and swear at us, telling us that they could take
the devil out of us in a very little while, if we were
only in their hands.

While in jail, we found ourselves in much more
comfortable quarters than we .expected when we went
there. We did not get much to eat, nor that which
was very good ; but we had a good clean room, from
the windows of which we could see what was going on
in the street, which was very much better than though
we had been placed in one of the dark, damp cells.
Upon the whole, we got along very well, so far as the
jail and its keeper were concerned. Immediately after
the holidays were over, contrary to all our expecta-
tions, Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Freeland came up to
Easton, and took Charles, the two Henrys, and John,
out of jail, and carried them home, leaving me alone.
I regarded this separation as a final one. It caused
me more pain than any thing else in the whole transac-
tion. I was ready for any thing rather than separa-
tion. I supposed that they had consulted together, and
had decided that, as I was the whole cause of the in-
tention of the others to run away, it was hard to
make the innocent suffer with the guilty ; and that

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 93

they had, therefore, concluded to take the others home,
and sell me, as a warning to the others that remained.
It is due to the noble Henry to say, he seemed almost
as reluctant at leaving the prison as at leaving home
to come to the prison. But we knew we should, in all
probability, be separated, if we were sold ; and since
he was in their hands, he concluded to go peaceably
home. ,

I was now left to my fate. I was all alone, and
within the walls of a stone prison. But a few days
before, and I was full of hope. I expected to have
been safe in a land of freedom ; but now I was cov-
ered with gloom, sunk down to the utmost despair. I
thought the possibility of freedom was gone. I was
kept in this way about one week, at the end of which,
Captain Auld, my master, to my surprise and utter as-
tonishment, came up, and took me out, with the inten-
tion of sending me, with a gentleman of his acquaint-
ance, into Alabama. But, from some cause or other,
he did not send me to Alabama, but concluded to send
me back to Baltimore, to live again with his brother
Hugh, and to learn a trade.

Thus, after an absence of three years and one
month, I was once more permitted to return to my old
home at Baltimore. My master sent me away, be-
cause there existed against me a very great prejudice
in the community, and he feared I might be killed.

In a few weeks after I went to Baltimore, .Master
Hugh hired me to Mr. William Gardner, an extensive
ship-builder, on FelPs Point. I was put there to learn
how to calk. It, however, proved a very unfavorable
place for the accomplishment of this object. Mr.

94 NARRATIVE OF THE

•

Gardner was engaged that spring in building two large
man-of-war brigs, professedly for the Mexican govern-
ment. The vessels were to be launched in the July
of that year, and in failure thereof, Mr. Gardner was
to lose a considerable sum ; so that when I entered, all
was hurry. There was no time to learn any Uiing.
Every man had to do that which he knew how to do.
In entering the ship-yard, my orders from Mr. Gardner
were, to do whatever the carpenters commanded me to
do. This was placing me at the beck and call of about
seventy-five men. I was to regard all these as mas-
ters. Their word was to be my law. My situation
was a most trying one. At times I needed a dozen
pair of hands. I was called a dozen ways in the space
of a single minute. Three or four voices would strike
my ear at the same moment. It was — " Fred., come
help me to cant this timber here." — "Fred., come
carry this timber yonder." — " Fred., bring that roller
here." — "Fred., go get a fresh can of water." —
" Fred., come help saw off the end of this timber." —
"Fred., go quick, and get the crowbar." — "Fred.,
hold on the end of this fall." — "Fred., go to the
blacksmith's shop, and get a new punch." — " Hurra,
Fred. 1 run and bring me a cold chisel." — "I say,
Fred., bear a hand, and get up a fire as quick as light-
ning under that steam-box." — " Halloo, nigger ! come,
turn this grindstone." — " Come, come ! move, move !
and bowse this timber forward." — " I say, darky, blast
your eyes, why don't you heat up some pitch ? " —
"Halloo! halloo! halloo!" (Three voices at the
same time.) " Come here ! — Go there ! — Hold on

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 95

where you are ! Damn you, if you move, I'll knock
your brains out ! "

This was my school for eight months ; and I might
have remained there longer, but for a most horrid
fight I had with four of the white apprentices, in which
my left eye was nearly knocked out, and I was hor-
ribly mangled in other respects. The facts in the case
were these : Until a verv little while after I went there,
white and black ship-carpenters worked side by side,
and no one seemed to see any impropriety in it. All
hands seemed to be very well satisfied. Many of the
black carpenters were freemen. Things seemed to be
going on very well. All at once, the white carpenters
knocked off, and said they would not work with free
colored workmen. Their reason for this, as alleged,
was, that if free colored carpenters were encouraged,
they would soon take the trade into their own hands,
and poor white men would be thrown out of employ-
ment. They therefore felt called upon at once to put
a stop to it. And, taking advantage of Mr. Gardner's
necessities, they broke off, swearing they would work
no longer, unless he would discharge his black carpen-
ters. Now, though this did not extend to me in form,
it did reach me in fact. My fellow-apprentices very
soon began to feel it degrading to them to work with
me. They began to put on airs, and talk about the
u niggers " taking the country, saying we all ought to
be killed ; and, being encouraged by the journeymen,
they commenced making my condition as hard as they
could, by hectoring me aroynd, and sometimes striking
me. I, of course, kept the vow I made after the fight
with Mr. Covey, and struck back again, regardless of

96 NARRATIVE OF THE

consequences ; and while I kept them from combining,
I succeeded very well ; for I could whip the whole of
them, taking them separately. They, however, at
length combined, and came upon me, armed with
sticks, stones, and heavy handspikes. One came in
front with a half brick. There was one at each side
of me, and one behind me. While I was attending to
those in front, and on either side, the one behind ran
up with the handspike, and struck me a heavy blow
upon the head. It stunned me. I fell, and with this
they all ran upon me, and fell to beating me with their
fists. I let them lay on for a while, gathering strength.
In an instant, I gave a sudden surge, and rose to my
hands and knees. Just as I did that, one of their num-
ber gave me, with his heavy boot, a powerful kick in
the left eye. My eyeball seemed to have burst.
When they saw my eye closed, and badly swollen,
they left me. With this I seized the handspike, and
for a time pursued them. But here the carpenters in-
terfered, and I thought I might as well give it up. It
was impossible to stand my hand against so many.
All this took place in sight of not less than fifty white
ship-carpenters, and not one interposed a friendly
word ; but some cried, " Kill the damned nigger ! Kill
him ! kill him ! He struck a white person." I found
my only chance for life was in flight. I succeeded in
getting away without an additional blow, and barely so ;
for to strike a white man is death by Lynch law, — and
that was the law in Mr. Gardner's ship-yard ; nor is
there much of any other out of Mr. Gardner's ship-
yard.

I went directly home, and told the story of my

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 9?

wrongs to Master Hugh ; and I am happy to say of him,
irreligious as he was, his conduct was heavenly, com-
pared with that of his brother Thomas under similar
circumstances. He listened attentively to my narra-
tion of the circumstances leading to the savage outrage,
and gave many proofs of his strong indignation at it.
The heart of my once oVerkind mistress was again
melted into pity. My puffed-out eye and blood-covered
face moved her to tears. She took a chair by me,
washed the blood from my face, and, with a mother's
tenderness, bound up my head, covering the wounded
eye with a lean piece of fresh beef. It was almost
compensation for my suffering to witness, once more, a
manifestation of kindness from this, my once affectionate
old mistress. Master Hugh was very much enraged.
He gave expression to his feelings by pouring out
curses upon the heads of those who did the deed. As
soon as I got a little the better of my bruises, he took
me with him to Esquire Watson's, on Bond Street, to
see what could be done about the matter. Mr. Watson
inquired who saw the assault committed. Master Hugh
told him it was done in Mr. Gardner's ship-yard, at mid-
day, where there were a large company of men at work.
"As to that," he said, "the deed was done, and there
was no question as to who did it." His answer was,
he could do nothing in the case, unless some white man ,
would come forward and testify. He could issue no
warrant on my word. If I had been killed in the pres-
ence of a thousand colored people, their testimony
combined would have been insufficient to have arrested
one of the murderers. Master Hugh, for once, was
compelled to say this state of things was too bad. Of'
7

98 NARRATIVE OF THE

course, it was impossible to get any white man to
volunteer his testimony in my behalf, and against the
white young men. Even those who may have sympa-
thized with me were not prepared to do this. . It
required a degree of courage unknown to them to do
so ; for just at that time, the slightest manifestation of
humanity toward a colored person was denounced as
abolitionism, and that name subjected its bearer to
frightful liabilities. The watchwords of the bloody-
minded in that region, and in those days, were, " Damn
the abolitionists ! " and " Damn the niggers ! " There
was nothing done, and probably nothing would have
been done if I had been killed. Such was, and such
remains, the state of things. in the Christian city of
Baltimore.

Master Hugh, finding he could get no redress, re-
fused to let me go back again to Mr. Gardner. He
kept me himself, and his wife dressed my wound till I
was again restored to health. He then took me into
the ship-yard of which he was foreman, in the employ-
ment of Mr. Walter Price. There I was immediately
set to calking, and very soon learned the art of using
my mallet and irons. In the course of one year from
the time I left Mr. Gardner's, I was able to command
the highest wages given to the most experienced calk-
ers. I was now of some importance to my master. I
was bringing him from six to seven dollars per week.
I sometimes brought him nine dollars per week : my
wages were a dollar and a half a day. After learning
how to calk, I sought my own employment, made
my own contracts, and collected the money which I
earned. My pathway became much more smooth

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 99

than before ; my condition was now much more com-
fortable. When I could get no calking to do, I did
nothing. During these leisure times, those old notions
about freedom would steal over me again. When in
Mr. Gardner's employment, I was kept in such a per-
petual whirl of excitement, I could think of nothing,
scarcely, but my life ; and in thinking of my life, I
almost forgot my liberty. I have observed this in my
experience of slavery, — that whenever my condition
was improved, instead of its increasing my contentment,
it only increased my desire to be free, and set me to
thinking of plans to gain my freedom. I have found
that, to make a contented slave, it is necessary to make
a thoughtless one. It is necessary to darken his mora!
and mental vision, and, as far as possible, to annihilate
the power of reason. He must be able to detect no in-
consistencies in slavery ; he must be made to feel that
slavery is right ; and he can be brought to that only
when he ceases to be a man.

I was now getting, as I have said, one dollar and
fifty cents per day. I contracted for it ; I earned it ;
it was paid to me ; it was rightfully my own ; yet,
upon each returning Saturday night, I was compelled
to deliver every cent of that money to Master Hugh.
And why ? Not because he earned it, — not because
he had any hand in earning it, — not because I owed it
to him, — nor because he possessed the slightest shadow-
of a right to it ; but solely because he had the power to
compel me to give it up. The right of the grim-vis-
aged pirate upon the high seas is exactly the same.

100 NARRATIVE OF THE

CHAPTER XI.

I now come to that part of my life during which I
planned, and finally succeeded in making, my escape
from slavery. But before narrating any of the pe-
culiar circumstances, I deem it proper to make known
my intention not to state all the facts connected with
the transaction. My reasons for pursuing this course
may be understood from the following : First, were
I to give a minute statement of all the facts, it is not
only possible, but quite probable, that others would
thereby be involved in the most embarrassing difficul-
ties. Secondly, such a statement would most undoubt-
edly induce greater vigilance on the part of slave-
holders than has existed heretofore among them j
which would, of course, be the means of guarding a
door whereby some dear brother bondman might
escape his galling chains. I deeply regret the neces-
sity that impels me to suppress any thing of impor-
tance connected with my experience in slavery. It
would afford me great pleasure indeed, as well as ma-
terially add to the interest of my narrative, were I at
liberty to gratify a curiosity, which I know exists in the
minds of many, by an accurate statement of all the
facts pertaining to my most fortunate escape. But I
must deprive myself of this pleasure, and the curious of
the gratification which such a statement would afford.
I would allow myself to suffer under the greatest impu-
tations which evil-minded men might suggest, rather
than exculpate myself, and thereby run the hazard

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS- 101

of closing the slightest avenue by which a brother
slave might clear himself of the chains and fetters of
slavery.

I have never approved of the very public manner in
which some of our western friends have conducted
what they call the underground railroad, but which, I
think, by their open declarations, has been made most
emphatically the upperground railroad. I honor those
good men and women for their noble daring, and ap-
plaud them for willingly subjecting themselves to
bloody persecution, by openly avowing their participa-
tion in the escape of slaves. I, however, can see very
little good resulting from such a course, either to them-
selves or the slaves escaping ; while, upon the other
hand, I see and feel assured that those open declara-
tions are a positive evil to the slaves remaining, who
are seeking to escape. They do nothing towards en-
lightening the slave, whilst they do much towards en-
lightening the master. They stimulate him to greater
watchfulness, and enhance his power to capture his
slave. We owe something to the slaves south of the
line as well as to those north of it ; and in aiding the
latter on their way to freedom, we should be careful to
do nothing which would be likely to hinder the former
from escaping from slavery. I would keep the merci-
less slaveholder profoundly ignorant of the means of
flight adopted Jby the slave. I would leave him to im-
agine himself surrounded by myriads of invisible tor-
mentors, ever ready to snatch from his infernal grasp
his trembling prey. Let him be left to feel his way in
the dark ; let darkness commensurate with his crime
hover over him : and let him feel that at every step he

102 NARRATIVE OF THE

takes, in pursuit of the flying bondman, he is running
the frightful risk of having his hot brains dashed out
by an invisible agency. Let us render the tyrant no
aid ; let us not hold the light by which he can trace
the footprints of our flying brother. But enough of
this. I will now proceed to the statement of those
facts, connected with my escape, for which I am alone
responsible, and for which no one can be made to suffer
but myself.

In the early part of the year 1838, I became quite
restless. I could see no reason why I should, at the
end of each week, pour the reward of my toil into the
purse of my master. When I carried to him my
weekly wages, he would, after counting the money,
look me in the face with a robber-like fierceness, and
ask, " Is this all ? " He was satisfied with nothing
less than the last cent. He would, however, when I
made him six dollars, sometimes give me six cents, to
encourage me. It had the opposite effect. I regarded
it as a sort of admission of my right to the whole.
The fact that he gave me any part of my wages was
proof, to my mind, that he believed me entitled to the
whole of them. I always felt worse for having received
any thing ; for I feared that the giving me a few cents
would ease his conscience, and make him feel himself
to be a pretty honorable sort of robber. My discon-
tent grew upon me. I was ever on the look-out for
means of escape ; and, finding no direct means, I de-
termined to try to hire my time, with a view of getting
money with which to make my. escape. In the
spring of 1838, when Master Thomas came to Balti-
more to purchase his spring goods, I got an opportu-

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 103

nity, and applied to him to allow me to hire my time.

He unhesitatingly refused my request, and told me this
was another stratagem by which to escape. He told
me I could go nowhere but that he could get me ; and
that, in the event of my running away, he should spare
no pains in his efforts to catch me. He exhorted me
to content myself, and be obedient. He told me, if I
would be happy, I must lay out no plans for the
future. He said, if I behaved myself properly, he
would tajte care of me. Indeed, he advised me to com-
plete thoughtlessness of the future, and taught me to
depend solely upon him for happiness. He seemed to
see -fully the pressing necessity of setting aside my in-
tellectual nature, in order to contentment in slavery.
But in spite of him, and even in spite of myself, I con-
tinued to think, and to think about the injustice of my
enslavement, and the means of escape.

About two months after this, I applied to Master
Hugh for the privilege of hiring my time. He was
not acquainted with the fact that I had applied to Mas-
ter Thomas, and had been refused. He too, at first,
seemed disponed to refuse ; but, after some reflection,
he granted me the privilege, and proposed the follow-
ing terms: I was to be-allowcd all my time, make all
contracts with those for whom I worked, and find my
own employment ; and, in return for this liberty, I was
to pay him three dollars at the end of each week ; find
myself in calking tools, and in board and clothing.
My board was two dollars and a half per week. This,
with the wear and tear of clothing and calking tools,
made my regular expenses aboul six dollars per week.
This amount I was compelled to make up, or relinquish

104 NARRATIVE OF THE

the privilege of hiring my time. Rain or shine, work
or no work, at the end of each week the money must
be forthcoming, or I must give up my privilege. This
arrangement, it will be perceived, was decidedly in
my master's favor. It relieved him of all need of
looking after me. His money was sure. He received
all the benefits of slaveholding without its evils ; while
I endured all the evils of a slave, and suffered all the
care and anxiety of a freeman. I found it a hard bar-
gain. But, hard as it was, I thought it better than the
old mode of getting along. It was a step towards
freedom to be allowed to bear the responsibilities of a
freeman, and I was determined to hold on upon it. I
bent myself to the work of making money. I was
ready to work at night as well as day, and by the most
untiring perseverance and industry, I made enough to
meet my expenses, and lay up a little money every
week. I went on thus from May till August. Master
Hugh then refused to allow me to hire my time longer.
The ground for his refusal was a failure on my part,
one Saturday night, to pay him for my week's time.
This failure was occasioned by my attending a camp
meeting about ten miles from Baltimore. During the
week, I had entered into an engagement with a number
of young friends to start from Baltimore to the camp
ground early Saturday evening ; and being detained
by my employer, I was unable to get down to Master
Hugh's without disappointing the company. I knew
that Master Hugh was in no special need of the money
that night. I therefore decided to go to camp meeting,
and upon my return pay him the three dollars. I
staid at the camp meeting one day longer than I in-

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 105

tended when I left. But as soon as I returned, I called
upon him to pay him w hat he considered his due. I
found him. very angry; he could scarce restrain his
wrath. He said he had a great mind to give me a
severe whipping. He wished to know how I dared go
out of the city without asking his permission. I told
him I hired my time, and while I paid him the price
which he asked for it, I did not know that I was bound
to ask him when and where I should go. This reply
troubled him; and, after reflecting a few moments, he
turned to me, and said I should hire my time no long-
er ; that the next thing he should know of, I would be
running away. . Upon the same plea, he told me to
bring my tools and clothing home forthwith. I did so ;
but instead of seeking work, as I had been accustomed to
do previously to hiring my time, I spent the whole
week without the performance of a single stroke of
work. I did this in retaliation. Saturday night, he
called upon me as usual for my week's wages. I told
him I had no wages ; I had done no work that week.
Here we were upon the point of coming* to blows.
He raved, and swore his determination to get hold of
me. I did not allow myself a single word ; but was
resolved, if he laid the weight of his hand upon me, it
should be blow for blow. He did not strike me, but
told me that he would find me in constant employ-
ment in future. I thought the matter over during
the next day, Sunday, and finally resolved upon
the third day of September, as the day upon which I
would make a second attempt to secure my freedom.
I now had three weeks during which to prepare for my
journey. Early on Monday morning, before Master

106 NARRATIVE OF THE

Hugh had time to make any engagement for me, I
went out and got employment of Mr. Butler, at his
ship-yard near the drawbridge, upon what is called
the Cijy Block, thus making it unnecessary for him to
seek employment for me. At the end of the week, I
brought him between eight and nine dollars. He
seemed very well pleased, and asked me why I did not
do the same the week before. He little knew what
my plans were. My object in working steadily was to
remove any suspicion he might entertain of my in-
tent to run away; and in this I succeeded admirably.
I suppose he thought I was never better satisfied with
my condition than at the very time during which I was
planning my escape. The second week passed, and
again I carried him my full wages ; and so well
pleased was he, that he gave me twenty-five cents,
(quite a large sum for a slaveholder to give a slave,)
and bade me to make a good use of it. I told him I
would.

Things went on without very smoothly indeed, but
within there was trouble. It is impossible for me to
describe my feelings as the time of m}- contemplated
start drew near. I had a number of warm-hearted
friends in Baltimore, — friends that I loved almost as I
did my life, — and the thought of being separated from
them forever was painful beyond expression. It is my
opinion that thousands would escape from slavery, who
now remain, but for the strong cords of affection that
bind them to their friends. The thought of leaving
my friends was decidedly the most painful thought with
which I had to contend. The love of them was my
tender point, and shook my decision more than all

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 107

things else. Besides the pain of separation, the dread
and apprehension of a failure exceeded what I had
experienced at my first attempt. The appalling de-
feat I then sustained returned to torment me. I
felt .assured that, if I failed in this attempt, my case
would be a hopeless one — it would seal my fate as a
slave forever. I could not hope to get off. with any
thing less than the severest punishment, and being
placed beyond the means of escape. It required no
very vivid imagination to depict the most frightful
scenes through which I should have to pass, in case I
failed. The wretchedness of slavery, and the blessed-
ness of freedom, were perpetually before me. It was
life and death with me. But I remained firm, and, ac-
cording to my resolution, on the third day of Septem-
ber, 1838, I left my chains, and succeeded in reach-
ing New York without the slightest interruption of any
kind. How I did so, — what means I adopted, — what
direction I travelled, and by what mode of conveyance,
— I must leave unexplained, for the reasons before
mentioned.

I have been frequently asked how I felt when I found
myself in a free State. I have never been able to an-
swer the question with any satisfaction to myself. It
was a moment of the highest excitement I ever expe-
rienced. I suppose I felt as one may imagine the un-
armed mariner to feel when he is rescued by a friendly
man-of-war from the pursuit of a pirate. In writing
to a dear friend, immediately after my arrival at New
York, I said I felt like one who had escaped a den of
hungry lions. This state of mind, however, very soon
subsided ; and I was again seized with a feeling of great

108 NARRATIVE OF THE

insecurity and loneliness. I was yet liable to be taken
back, and subjected to all the tortures of slavery. This
in itself was enough to damp the ardor of my enthu-
siasm. But the loneliness overcame me. There I
was in the midst of thousands, and yet a perfect stran-
ger ; without home and without friends, in the midst
of thousands of my own brethren — children of a com-
mon Father, and yet I dared not to unfold to any one of
them my sad condition. I was afraid to speak to any
one for fear of speaking to the wrong one, and thereby
falling into the hands of money-loving kidnappers,
whose business it was to lie in wait for the panting fu-
gitive, as the ferocious beasts of the forest lie in wait
for their prey. The motto which I adopted when I
started from slavery was this — " Trust no man ! " I
saw in every white man an enemy, and in almost
every colored man cause for distrust. It was a most
painful situation ; and, to understand it, one must needs
experience it, or imagine himself in similar circum-
stances. Let him be a fugitive slave in a strange
land — aland given up to be the hunting-ground for
slaveholders — whose inhabitants -are legalized kidnap-
pers — where he is every moment subjected to the
terrible liability of being seized upon by his fellow-
men, as the hideous crocodile seizes upon his prey ! —
I say, let him place himself in my situation — without
home or friends — without money or credit — wanting
shelter, and no one to give it — wanting bread, and no
money to buy it, — and at the same time let him feel
that he is pursued by merciless men-hunters, and in
total darkness as to what to do, where to go, or
where to stay, — perfectly helpless both as to the

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 109

means of defence and means of escape, — in the
midst of plenty, yet suffering the terrible gnavvings of
hunger, — in the midst of houses, yet having no home,
— among fellow-men, yet feeling as if in the midst of
wild beasts, whose greediness to swallow up the trem-
bling and half-famished fugitive is only equalled by
that with which the monsters of the deep swallow up
the helpless fish upon which they subsist, — I say, let
him be placed in this most trying situation, — the situ-
ation in which I was placed, — then, and not till then,
will he fully appreciate the hardships of, and know
how to sympathize with, the toil-worn and whip-scarred
fugitive slave.

Thank Heaven, I remained but a short time in this
distressed situation. I was relieved from it by the hu-
mane hand of Mr. David Ruggles, whose vigilance,
kindness, and perseverance, I shall never forget. I am
glad of an opportunity to express, as far as words can,
the love and gratitude I bear him. Mr. Ruggles is
now afflicted with blindness, and is himself in need of
the same kind offices .which he was once so forward in
the performance of toward others. I had been in New
York but a few days, when Mr. Ruggles sought me out,
and very kindly took me to his boarding-house at the
corner of Church and Lespenard Streets. Mr. Rug-
gles was then very deeply engaged in the memorable
Darg case, as well as attending to a number of other
fugitive slaves, devising ways and means for their suc-
cessful escape ; and, though watched and hemmed in on
almost every side, he seemed to be more than a match
for his enemies.

Very soon after I went to Mr. Ruggles, he wished

110 NARRATIVE OF THE

to know of me where I wanted to go ; as he deemed it
unsafe for me to remain in New York. I told him I
was a calker, and should like to go where I could get
work. I thought of going to Canada ; but he decided
against it, and in favor of my going to New Bedford,
thinking I should be able to get work there at my
trade. At this time, Anna,* my intended wife, came
on ; for I wrote to her immediately after my arrival at
New York, (notwithstanding my homeless, houseless,
and helpless condition,) informing her of my successful
flight, and wishing her to come on forthwith. In a
few days after her arrival, Mr. Ruggles called in the
Rev. J. AY. C. Pennington, who, in the presence of Mr.
Ruggles, Mrs. Michaels, and two or three others, per-
formed the marriage ceremony, and gave us a certifi-
cate, of which the following is an exact copy : —

" This may certify, that I joined together in holy
matrimony Frederick Johnsonf and Anna Murray, as
man and wife, in the presence of Mr. David Ruggles
and Mrs. Michaels.

" James W. C. Pennington.

" New York, Sept. 15, 1838."

Upon receiving this certificate, and a five-dollar bill
from Mr. Ruggles, I shouldered one part of our bag-
gage, and Anna took up the other, and we set out
forthwith to take passage on board of the steamboat
John W. Richmond for Newport, on our way to New

* She was free.

t 1 had changed ray name from Frederick Bailey to that
of Johnson.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. Ill

Bedford. Mr. Ruggles gave me a letter to a Mr. Shaw
in Newport, and told me, in case my money did not
Berve me to New Bedford, to stop in Newport and ob-
tain further assistance; but upon our arrival at New-
port, we were so anxious to get to a place of safety, that,
notwithstanding we lacked the necessary money to pay
our fare, we decided to take seats in the stage, and
promise to pay when we got to New Bedford. We
were encouraged to do this by two excellent gentle-
men, residents of New Bedford, whose names I after-
ward ascertained to be Joseph Ricketson and William
C. Taber. They seemed at once to understand our
circumstances, and gave us such assurance of their
friendliness as put us fully at ease in their presence.
It was good indeed to meet with such friends, at such a
time. Upon reaching New Bedford, we were directed
to the house of Mr. Nathan Johnson, by whom we
were kindly received, and hospitably provided for.
Both Mr. and Mrs. Johnson took a deep and lively in-
terest in our welfare. They proved themselves quite
worthy of the name of abolitionists. When the stage-
driver found us unable to pay our fare, he held on
upon our baggage as security for the debt. I had but
to mention the fact to Mr. Johnson, and he forthwith
advanced the money.

We now began to feel a degree of safety, and to
prepare ourselves for the duties and responsibilities of
a life of freedom. On the morning after our arrival at
New Bed ford, "while at the breakfast-table, the question
arose as to what name I should be called by. The
name given me by my mother was, " Frederick Au-
gustus Washington Bailey." I, however, had dispensed

1 12 NARRATIVE OF THE

with the two middle names long before I left Maryland,
so that I was generally known by the name of " Fred-
erick Bailey." I started from Baltimore bearing the
name of "Stanley." When I got to New York, I
again changed my name to " Frederick Johnson," and
thought that would be the last change. But when I
got to New Bedford, I found it necessary again to
change my name. The reason of this necessity was,
that there were so many Johnsons in New Bedford, it
was already quite difficult to distinguish between them.
I gave Mr. Johnson the privilege of choosing me a
name, but told him he must not take from me- the
name of " Frederick." I must hold on to that, to pre-
serve a sense of my identity. Mr. Johnson had just
been reading the " Lady of the Lake," and at once
suggested that my name be " Douglass." From that
time until now I have been called " Frederick Doug-
lass ; " and as I am more widely known by that name
than by either of the others, I shall continue to use it
as my own.

I was quite disappointed at the general appearance
of things in New Bedford. The impression which I
had received respecting the character and condition of
the people of the north, I found to be singularly erro-
neous. I had very strangely supposed, while in slavery,
that few of the comforts, and scarcely any of the
luxuries, of life were enjoyed at the north, compared
with what were enjoyed by the slaveholders of the
south. I probably came to this conclusion from the
fact that northern people owned no slaves. I supposed
that they were about upon a level with the non-slave-
holding population of the south. I knew they were ex-

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 113

ceedingly poor, and I had been accustomed to regard
their poverty as the necessary consequence of their
being non-slaveholders. I had somehow imbibed the
opinion that, in the absence of slaves, there could be
no wealth, and very little refinement. And upon com-
ing to the north, I expected to meet with a rough,
hard-handed, and uncultivated population, living in the
most Spartan-like simplicity, knowing nothing of the
ease, luxury, pomp, and grandeur of southern slave-
holders. Such being my conjectures, any one ac-
quainted with the appearance of New Bedford may
very readily infer how palpably I must have seen my
mistake.

In the afternoon of the day when I reached New
Bedford, I visited the wharves, to take a view of
the shipping. Here I found myself surrounded with
the strongest proofs of wealth. Lying at the wharves,
and riding in the stream, I saw many ships of the
finest model, in the best order, and of the largest size.
Upon the right and left, I was walled in by granite
warehouses of the widest dimensions, stowed to their
utmost capacity with the necessaries and comforts of
life. Added to this, almost every body seemed to be
at work, but noiselessly so, compared with what I had
been accustomed to in Baltimore. There were no
loud songs heard from those engaged in loading and
unloading ships. I heard no deep oaths or horrid
curses on the laborer. I saw no whipping of men ;
but all seemed to go smoothly on. Every man ap-
peared to understand his work, and went at it with a
sober, yet cheerful earnestness, which betokened the
deep interest which he felt in what he was doing, as
8

114 NARRATIVE OF THE

well as a sense of his own dignity as a man. To me
this looked exceedingly strange. From the wharves I
strolled around and over the town, gazing with won-
der and admiration at the splendid churches, beautiful
dwellings, and finely-cultivated gardens ; evincing an
amount of wealth, comfort, taste, and refinement, such
as I had never seen in any part of slaveholding
Maryland.

Every thing looked clean, new, and beautiful. I saw
few or no dilapidated houses, with poverty-stricken
inmates ; no half-naked children and barefooted women,
such as I had been accustomed to see in Hillsborough,
Easton, St. Michael's, and Baltimore. The people
looked more able, stronger healthier, and happier,
than those of Maryland. I was for once made glad by
a view of extreme wealth, without being saddened by
seeing extreme poverty. But the most astonishing as
well as the most interesting thing to me was the con-
dition of the colored people, a great many of whom,
like myself, had escaped thither as a refuge from the
hunters of men. I found many, who had not been
seven years out of their chains, living in finer houses,
and evidently enjoying more of the comforts of life,
than the average of slaveholders in Maryland. I will
venture to assert that my friend Mr. Nathan Johnson
(of whom I can say with a grateful heart, " I was hun-
gry, and he gave me meat ; I was thirsty, and he gave
me drink ; I was a stranger, and he took me in ") lived
in a neater house ; dined at a better table ; took, paid for,
and read, more newspapers ; better understood the
moral, religious, and political character of the nation, —
than nine tenths of the slaveholders in Talbot county,

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 115

Maryland. Yet Mr. Johnson was a working man. His
hands were hardened by toil, and not his alone, but
those also of Mrs. Johnson. I found the colored
people much more spirited than I had supposed they
would be. I found among them a determination to
protect each other from the blood-thirsty kidnapper, at
all hazards. Soon after my arrival, I was told of a
circumstance which illustrated their spirit. A colored
man and a fugitive slave were on unfriendly terms.
The former was heard to threaten the latter with in-
forming his master of his whereabouts. Straightway
a meeting was called among the colored people, under
the stereotyped notice, " Business of importance ! "
The betrayer was invited to attend. The people came
at the appointed hour, and organized the meeting by
appointing a very religious old gentleman as president,
who, I believe, made a prayer, after which he addressed
the meeting as follows: " Friends, we have got him
here, and I ivould recommend that you young men
just take him outside the door, and kill him ! " With
this, a number of them bolted at him ; but they were
intercepted by some more timid than themselves, and
the betrayer escaped their vengeance, and has not
been seen in New Bedford since. I believe there
have been no more such threats, and should there be
hereafter, I doubt not that death would be the con-
sequence.

I found employment, the third day after my arrival,
in stowing a sloop with a load of oil. It was new,
dirty, and hard work for me ; but I went at it with a
glad heart and a willing hand. I was now my own
master. It was a happy moment, the rapture of which

116 NARRATIVE OF THE

can be understood only by those who have been slaves.
It was the first work, the reward of which was to be
entirely my own. There was no Master Hugh stand-
ing ready, the moment I earned the money, to rob me
of it. I worked that day with a pleasure I had never
before experienced. I was at work for myself and
newly-married wife. It was to me the starting-point
of a new existence. When I got through with that
job, I went in pursuit of a job of calking ; but such was
the strength of prejudice against color, among the
white calkers, that they refused to work with me, and
of course I could get no employment.* Finding my
trade of no immediate benefit, I threw off my calking
habiliments, and prepared myself to do any kind of
work I could get to do. Mr. Johnson kindly let me
have his wood-horse and saw, and I very soon found
myself a plenty of work. There was no work too
hard — none too dirty. I was ready to saw wood,
shovel coal, carry the hod, sweep the chimney, or roll
oil casks, — all of which I did for nearly three years in
New Bedford, before I became known to the anti-
slavery world.

In about four months after I went to New Bedford,
there came a young man to me, and inquired if I did
not wish to take the " Liberator." I told him I did ;
but, just having made my escape from slavery, I re-
marked that I was unable to pay for it then. I, how-
ever, finally became a subscriber to it. The paper
came, and I read it from week to week with such

* 1 am told that colored persons can now get employment
at calking in New Bedford — a result of anti-slavery effort.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 117

feelings as it would be quite idle for me to attempt
to describe. The paper became my meat and my
drink. My soul was set all on fire. Its sympathy for
my brethren in bonds — its scathing denunciations of
slaveholders — its faithful exposures of slavery —
and its powerful attacks upon the upholders of the insti-
tution— sent a thrill of joy through my soul, such as
I had never felt before !

I had not long been a reader of the l( Liberator,"
before I got a pretty correct idea of the principles,
measures and spirit of the anti-slavery reform. I took
right hold of the cause. I could do but little ; but
what I could, I did with a joyful heart, and never felt
happier than when in an anti-slavery meeting. I sel-
dom had much to say at the meetings, because what I
wanted to say was said so much better by others. But,
while attending an anti-slavery convention at Nantucket,
on the 11th of August, 1841, I felt strongly moved to
speak, and was at the same time much urged to do so by
Mr. William C. Coffin, a gentleman who had heard me
speak in the colored people's meeting at New Bedford.
It was a severe cross, and I took it up reluctantly.
The truth was, I felt myself a slave, and the idea of
speaking to white people weighed me down. I spoke
but a few moments, when I felt a degree of freedom,
and said what I desired with considerable ease. From
that time until now, I have been engaged in pleading
the cause of my brethren — with what success, and
with what devotion, I leave those acquainted with my
labors to decide.

APPENDIX.

I find, since reading over the foregoing Narrative
that I have, in several instances, sppken in such a tone
and manner, respecting religion, as may possibly lead
those unacquainted with my religious views to suppose
me an opponent of all religion. To remove the liabil-
ity of such misapprehension, I deem it proper to ap-
pend the following brief explanation. What I have
said respecting and against religion, I mean strictly to
apply to the slaveholding religion of this land, and
.with no possible reference to Christianity proper ; for,
between the Christianity of this land, and the Chris-
tianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible differ-
ence — so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure,
and holy, is of necessity to reject the other as bad,
corrupt, and wicked. To be the friend of the one, is
of necessity to be the enemy of the other. I love the
pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ :
I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-
whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical
Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason,
but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion
of this land Christianity. I look upon it as the cli-
max of all misnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and
the grossest of all libels. Never was there a clearer
case of "stealing the livery of the court of heaven

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 119

to serve the dev'fl in." I am filled with unutterable
loathing when I contemplate the religious pomp and
show, together with the horrible inconsistencies, which
every where surround me. We have men-stealers for
ministers, women-whippcrs for missionaries, and cradle-
plunderers for church members. The man who wields
the blood-clotted cowskin during the week fills the
pulpit on Sunday, and claims to be a minister of the
meek and lowly Jesus- The man who robs me of my
earnings at the end ot each week meets me as a class-
leader on Sunday morning, to show me the way of
life, and the path of salvation. He who sells my sister,
for purposes of prostitution, stands forth as the pious
advocate of purity. He who proclaims it a religious
duty to read the Bible denies me the right of learning
to read the name of the God who made me. He who
is the religious advocate of marriage robs whole mil-
lions of its sacred influence, and leaves them to the
ravages of wholesale pollution. The warm defender
of the sacredness of the family relation is the same
that scatters whole families, — sundering husbands and
wives, parents and children, sisters and brothers, —
leaving the hut vacant, and the hearth desolate. We
see the thief preaching against theft, and the adulterer
against adultery. We have men sold to build churches,
women sold to support the gospel, and babes sold to
purchase Bibles for the poor heathen! all for the glory
of God and the good of souls ! The slave auctioneer's
bell and the church-going bell chime in with each
other, and the bitter cries of the heart-broken slave are
drowned in the religious shouts of his pious master.
Revivals of religion and revivals in the slave-trade go

120 APPENDIX TO THE

hand in hand together. The slave prison and the
church stand near each other. The clanking of fetters
and the rattling of chains in the prison, and the pious
psalm and solemn prayer in the church, may be heard
at the same time. The dealers in the bodies and souls
of men erect their stand in the presence of the pulpit,
and they mutually help each other. The dealer gives
his blood-stained gold to support the pulpit, and the pul-
pit, in return, covers his infernal business with the garb
of Christianity. Here we have religion and robbery
the allies of each other — devils dressed in angels'
robes, and hell presenting the semblance of paradise.

" Just God ! and these are they,

Who minister at thine altar, God of right !

Men who their hands, with prayer and blessing, lay
On Israel's ark of light.

" What ! preach, and kidnap men ?

Give thanks, and rob thy own afflicted poor ?
Talk of thy glorious liberty, and then

Bolt hard the captive's door ?

, " What ! servants of thy own

Merciful Son, who came to seek and save
The homeless and the outcast, fettering down
The tasked and plundered slave !

" Pilate and Herod friends !

Chief priests and rulers, as of old, combine !
Just God and holy ! is that church which lends

Strength to the spoiler thine ? "

The Christianity of America is a Christianity, of
whose votaries it may be as truly said, as it was of the

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 121

ancient scribes and Pharisees, " They bind heavy
burdens, and grievous to be borne, and lay them on
men's shoulders, but they themselves will not move
them with one of their lingers. All their works they do

tor to be seen of men. They love the uppermost

rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues,

and to be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi.

But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites !
for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men ; for
ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that
are entering to go in. Ye devour widows' houses, and
for a pretence make long prayers ; therefore ye shall
receive the greater damnation. Ye compass sea and
land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye
make him twofold more the child of hell than your-
selves. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypo-
crites ! for ye pay tithe of mint, and anise, and cum-
in, and have omitted the weightier matters of the
law, judgment, mercy, 'and faith; these "ought ye to
have done, and not to leave the other undone. Ye
blind guides ! which strain at a gnat, and swallow a
camel. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypo-
crites ! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and
of the platter ; but within, they are full of extortion and
excess. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hyp-
ocrites ! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which
indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of
dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so
ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but
within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity."

Dark and terrible as is this picture, I hold it to be
strictly true of the overwhelming mass of professed

122 APPENDIX TO THE

Christians in America. They strain at a gnat, and
swallow a camel. Could any thing be more true of
our churches ? They would be shocked at the propo-
sition of fellowshipping a sheep-stealer ; and at the
same time they hug to their communion a wicm-stealer,
and brand me with being an infidel, if I find fault with
them for it. They attend with Pharisaical strictness to
the outward forms of religion, and at the same time
neglect the weightier matters of the law, judgment,
mercy, and faith. They are always ready to sacrifice,
but seldom to show mercy. They are they who are
represented as professing to love God whom they have
not seen, whilst they hate their brother whom they
have seen. They love the heathen on the other side
of the globe. They can pray for him, pay money to
have the Bible put into his hand, and missionaries to
instruct him ; while they despise and totally neglect
the heathen at their own doors.

Such is, very briefly, my vmw of the religion of this
land ; and to avoid any misunderstanding, growing out
of the use of general terms, I mean, by the religion of
this land, that which is revealed in the words, deeds,
and actions, of those bodies, north and south, calling
themselves Christian churches, and yet in union with
slaveholders. It is against religion, as presented by
these bodies, that I have felt it my duty to testify.

I conclude these remarks by copying the following
portrait of the religion of the south, (which is, by
communion and fellowship, the religion of the north,)
which I soberly affirm is " true to the life," and with-
out caricature or the slightest exaggeration. It is said
to have been drawn, several years before the present

LIFE()i. r£REDERICK DOUGLASS. 1J.J

anti-slavery agitatioi :lT1 by a northern Methodist

preacher, who, while residing at the south, had an op-
portunity to see slaveholding morals, manners, and
piety, with his own eyes. " Shall I not visit for these
things? saith the Lord. Shall not my soul be avenged
on such a nation as this ? "

«A PARODY.

" Come, saints and sinners, hear me tell
How pious priests whip Jack and Nell,
And women buy and children sell,
And preach all sinners down to hell,
And sing of heavenly union.

" They'll bleat and baa, dona like goats,
Gorge down black sheep, and strain at motes,
Array their backs in fine black coats,
Then seize their negroes by their throats,
And choke, fte.heuvenly union.

'tr
" They '11 church you if you sip a dram,
And damn you if you steal a lamb ;
Yet rob old Tony, Doll, and Sam,
Of human rights, and bread and ham ;
Kidnapper's heavenly union.

« They '11 loudly talk of Christ's reward,
And bind his image with a cord,
And scold, and swing the lash abhorred,
And sell their brother in the Lord
To handcuffed heavenly union.

" They '11 read and sing a sacred song,
And make a prayer both loud and long,

124 APPENDIX TO lHE

And teach the rigfc* fluTu^ihe wrong,
Hailing the brother, sister throng,
With words of heavenly union.

" We wonder how such saints can sing,
Or praise the Lord upon the wing,
Who roar, and scold, and whip, and sting,
And to their slaves and mammon cling,
In guilty conscience union.

" They '11 raise tobacco, corn, and rye,
And drive, and thieve, and cheat, and lie,
And lay up treasures in the sky,
By making switch and cowskin fly,
In hope of heavenly union.

" They '11 crack old Tony on the skull,
And preach and roar like Bashan bull,
Or braying ass, of mischief full,
Then seize old Jacobs by th^ wool,
And pull for heaven vTvw on.

*v

" A roaring, ranting, sic ik man-thief,
Who lived on mutton, veal, and beef,
Yet never would afford relief
To needy, sable sons of grief,
Was big with heavenly union.

" ' Love not the world,' the preacher said,
And winked his eye, and shook his head ;
He seized on Tom, and Dick, and Ned,
Cut short their meat, and clothes, and bread,
Yet still loved heavenly union.

" Another preacher whining spoke
Of One whose heart for sinners broke :

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 125

He tied old Nanny to an oak,
And drew the blood at every stroke,
And prayed for heavenly union.

" Two others oped their iron jaws,
And waved their children-stealing paws ;
There sat their children in gewgaws ;
By stinting negroes' backs and maws,
They kept up heavenly union.

" All good from Jack another takes,
And entertains their flirts and rakes,
Who dress as sleek as glossy snakes,
And cram their mouths with sweetened cakes ;
And this goes down for union."

Sincerely and earnestly hoping that this little book may
do something toward throwing light on the American
slave system, and hastening the glad day of deliverance
to the millions of my brethren in bonds — faithfully re-
lying upon the power of truth, love, and justice, for sue
cess in my humble efforts — and solemnly pledging my
self anew to the sacred cause, — I subscribe myself,

FREDERICK DOUGLASS.
Lynn, Mass., April 28, 1845.

THE END.